Deadly Forecast

  Meanwhile M.J. bent down and with Candice’s help managed to keep Dutch on his feet. Overhead the sound of a low-flying helicopter made it impossible for M.J. to hear what the FBI director and the chief of police were saying, but one glance told her that the chief was receiving a pretty good dressing-down. She wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up losing a star in his constellation over it.

  As the helicopter flew wide, she heard another voice shout something that turned her blood cold. One of the officers came running over to the chief and the inspector. A call had just come in, he explained. A woman wearing what a witness described as a wedding dress and a bomb was currently running along Highway 71.

  Next to her, Dutch’s head snapped to attention and with effort he squared his shoulders and took a wobbly step forward. “Abby!” he gasped. “Jesus! We have to get to her!”

  Director Gaston looked from Dutch to Candice to Brice and then his eye traveled to the helicopter. Turning to the chief, he said, “We’ll need to borrow your bird, Art.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  I stared out the window of the Jamba Juice at a flock of birds picking at the remnants of a muffin tossed there by a careless customer. Candice and I had waited for Brice to show, and then we’d also stayed while Brice gently questioned Haley for nearly three hours. The interview produced little more information than we’d already managed to ferret out of her, but at the end of it, we were convinced that whoever this Buzz guy was, he was our killer.

  Haley was then told that the safest place for her would be in FBI custody, and the poor thing was scared enough to agree to go with Agents Cox and Rodriguez as they escorted her home to gather some things before they took her to a safe house.

  “Think she’ll be okay?” Candice asked me, and I pulled my attention away from the window to look over at my BFF, who in turn was staring at Haley being helped into her coat by Agent Cox. I felt a pang in my heart as I watched the young woman. She’d looked so pale and frightened when Brice had told her about Michelle and Taylor.

  “She’ll be in good hands with Cox and Rodriguez,” I said.

  Candice sighed. “Yeah, and now that we have a solid lead, I doubt it’ll be long before we figure out who this Buzz guy is.”

  But I wasn’t so sure. I was troubled by how elusive his energy felt—and as close as I knew we were to figuring out who he was, I had the unsettling feeling that we weren’t quite close enough.

  “I called the manager,” Brice said, interrupting my troubled thoughts. I looked over my shoulder to see that he’d come out from the back, where Haley’s coworker—who’d relieved her at five—told Brice he could find Debbie’s phone number.

  “Did she have anything to add?”

  Brice shook his head. “Got voice mail.”

  “She’s been in a meeting all day,” Candice told him.

  “We need to talk to her in case she remembers Buzz’s full name,” Brice said.

  “Taylor’s dad probably knows,” I suggested.

  Brice frowned and shook his head. “I called the team in Dubai overseeing Greene. They patched me through to him, and he had no idea Mimi was even seeing someone before she killed herself. He admitted that he didn’t have a close relationship with either of his daughters, and Taylor never mentioned this boyfriend of her sister’s to him either. He has no clue who he could be.”

  “Dammit!” I swore. Candice and Brice both looked at me expectantly. “Oh, whatever, you guys! This situation calls for an expletive or two. Plus, Dutch has let me off the swear-jar hook.”

  “Good thing,” Candice said. “You were likely to go broke otherwise.”

  I made a face at her and then focused on Brice. “How’d it go with Homeland? Did you get the case back?”

  Brice sighed. “No. Mostly we argued all day about it and we couldn’t get them to agree to let go of the case.”

  “Maybe filling them in about what you learned from Haley will help sway it our way,” Candice suggested.

  Brice rubbed his eyes. He looked tired enough to drop where he stood. “Gaston’s called for another meeting with them tomorrow. We’ll send a car over to the manager’s place tonight and see if we can interview her, and if she doesn’t know who Buzz is, then we’ll lay out our hand to Homeland tomorrow and hopefully it’ll be enough for us to win the case back.”

  Candice looped her arm through Brice’s. “In the meantime, how about we take you out for dinner?”

  Brice’s brow lifted. “That sounds like a great idea. Should we call Rivers and have him join us?”

  Candice looked to me, and I bit my lip. I couldn’t be around him until we’d nabbed this Buzz guy and the case was solved. “Uh…Dutch’s family is in town, babe, so I think he’ll be tied up with them,” Candice said, reading my body language well.

  Brice looked curiously at me but he didn’t press it and we all pretended like it was a perfectly natural thing for me to be hanging out with the two of them four days before my wedding. Then we went off to dinner and a much deserved night’s rest.

  * * *

  The next morning I woke up on Candice’s couch feeling grumpy and sore. I’m a light sleeper by nature, and Candice’s couch—although perfectly comfortable to sit on—couldn’t hold a candle to a real bed.

  I got up while it was still dark out and checked the time. It was five a.m. I knew that the two workout fiends would be up at any moment, and I didn’t want them to have to fish around in the dark while they tried not to disturb me, so I turned on a few lights and got the coffee going.

  While I futzed in the kitchen, I couldn’t ignore the most unsettling feeling that washed over me. I felt so strongly that I’d missed something—something important—and there were going to be major repercussions for that. “Morning,” Candice said just as the coffee was done brewing.

  “Hey.”

  “Sleep okay?”

  “Great,” I lied.

  “Brice is still asleep and he’s been working so hard I thought it’d be good to let him catch some z’s. He can run tomorrow.”

  “You headed downstairs?”

  “Yeah. Wanna come?”

  I started to make my “Are you kidding me?” face but then thought better of it. “You know what? I do. I can try walking on the treadmill.”

  “Without your cane?” she asked. I nodded. “Good for you, Sundance. You’ll do great on Saturday, honey. Milo’s got you if you have any balance issues, but if you can walk even twenty yards on the treadmill without needing to hold on, you’ll do perfect at the ceremony.”

  “It’s the stairs from the terrace to the aisle that worry me,” I said, moving back over to the couch to put on some shoes.

  “Again, you’ll have Milo there to help guide you down. And we can fit in some work on the stair-climber if you want. And maybe we can also talk to Cat and have her build you a ramp instead of stairs.”

  I slapped my forehead. “Cat!”

  Candice eyed me sharply. “You did call her last night, right?”

  “I forgot!” I said, a bit panicked as I looked for my phone. Oh, my sister was likely to be furious, because I’d promised—as in pinkie swore—that I’d meet with her by the end of the day yesterday, but all of that had gone out the window when we’d encountered Haley at Jamba Juice.

  I finally unearthed my phone from between the seat cushions and, sure enough, there were six new voice messages—all from my sister…my very angry sister. I looked at the time again. It was now 5:05 a.m. If I called and woke her up, would that make it worse?

  I settled for sending her a text…a very apologetic text, and told her that I would call her at eight a.m. Come hell or high water, I would contact her at that time.

  After that, Candice and I went downstairs and she put me through my paces. An hour and a half later we found Brice cooking us some pancakes and looking much better rested. “Your phone rang a couple of times, Cooper,” he told me the minute we got in the door.

  I looked skyward and playfully shook my fist. “Of all
the sisters in all the world…you had to give me Cat!”

  “Better call her,” Candice advised. “Get it over with.”

  I took a piece of bacon off the plate that Brice had prepared and moved to the couch. But when I looked at my phone, I noticed that the calls weren’t from my sister—they were from Dutch.

  I listened to my voice mails and immediately felt even guiltier. “Hey, dollface, it’s me. I didn’t hear from you last night. You okay?”

  Next message. “Abs, if you’re up, call me.”

  Next message. “Edgar, we have the closing at nine a.m. and I need to make sure you know how to get there. Call me as soon as you get this.”

  I was about to call Dutch back when I heard a buzz and saw Brice reach for his phone. “Harrison,” he said crisply. “Oh, hey, Rivers…yeah, she’s here, you want to talk to her?”

  I stood up, ready to take the phone, but Brice wasn’t handing it over. Instead he’d grabbed a pen and notepad, jotted something on it, and said, “Okay, buddy. I’ll pass on the message. Congrats on the new home.”

  With that, he hung up, ripped the note off the pad, and handed it to me. “That’s the address to the title company. Dutch said you don’t have to be there at nine. He’s arranged for you to go in whenever it’s convenient for you and sign. He says as long as he’s bringing the cashier’s check, they’ll give him the keys so he can start moving in.”

  I took the note and felt my lower lip quiver. I knew Dutch wasn’t trying to be mean; in fact, it was much more likely that he was simply being thoughtful and allowing me some extra time to get over to the title company. But given the energy in the ether that continued to haunt me like a bad storm on the horizon, I knew that I would wait until later in the morning to go over to the title company and sign the documents. It was a terrible thing to want nothing more than to be close to my fiancé, and yet feel like I couldn’t get far enough away.

  Hiding my face by turning back toward the couch, I asked, “Have you mentioned anything about our new lead to him, Brice?”

  “To Rivers?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “No. He’s on vacation…which is where you should be, Cooper.”

  I glanced up at him, and found him staring at me pointedly.

  Candice subtly laid a hand on his arm and he turned back to the pancakes, letting the subject drop, but I knew that while he was willing to tolerate my presence here without a hint of complaint, he didn’t exactly approve of what I was doing to Dutch by keeping my distance from him.

  After breakfast I excused myself and headed to the shower to get ready. When I came out, Brice had left for the office and Candice had left me a note that she had a nine a.m. appointment with her masseuse, and she’d be back at ten thirty to head with me over to Cat’s if I wanted.

  I called Cat and got her voice mail. I wondered if she was now ducking my calls, but I left her a message—heavy on the apologies—and then headed out of the condo.

  I drove to the address Dutch had given to Brice and parked in the back of the parking lot. At eight fifty I saw his Audi pull in and park, and he and his brother Chris walked into the building together.

  I thought it was sweet that Chris was going with him, but that still didn’t stop me from crying a little in the car. I told myself over and over that I was being ridiculous, but every time I went to get out of the car, that horrible foreboding feeling swept over me, and I couldn’t make myself go into the building while he was there.

  At last Dutch and Chris emerged, Chris slapping Dutch on the back affectionately, and in Dutch’s hands was a set of shiny keys. I knew that he and his brothers would get right to work moving our things into the new house.

  I waited a little bit before I got out of the car and headed inside to sign the documents too. The process took only twenty minutes, and I was told that my fiancé had all the keys. I assured the closer that I would get one from him.

  Getting back in my car, I sat there numbly for a bit, my mind a jumble of worries and disjointed thoughts. Amid that tangle was something out of place and rather odd—my mind kept flashing to the memory of the keys in Dutch’s hand.

  Sometimes I’ll see something that will seem completely random, but my intuitive brain will seize on it—as if saying, “There’s a clue there! Focus!”

  But focusing was next to impossible; I was a mess of feelings, fears, and forebodings. My phone rang as I fought internally with myself, and I was almost relieved to hear Cat’s voice on the other end. “What happened to you yesterday?”

  Cat always did have a way of getting right to the point. “I’m so sorry! We had a huge development in this case I’ve been working, Cat, and I lost all sense of time.”

  “Was your phone malfunctioning too?”

  I sighed. “No. I honestly just forgot.”

  Cat made a sound like she didn’t believe me. “You forgot? Abby, you’re getting married in four days! Four days!”

  “Yes, yes, yes, honey, I know. I’m really sorry, and I have the whole rest of today free. I’m yours from right now until midnight if you want me.”

  “Aren’t you moving today?”

  “Dutch and his brothers are handling it,” I said, hoping she didn’t press me on that.

  Cat was silent for a moment, and I knew she was trying to get over her frustration with me. At last she said, “Can you be here at eleven thirty?”

  “I can! Absolutely. See you in exactly one hour.”

  With that, I hung up and sent Candice a text, asking her to meet me at Cat’s in an hour. She didn’t text me back, which meant either she was ducking me, or she’d be there and didn’t feel the need to answer. With a little time to kill, I began to head back toward the rental house. I’d left most of my things there the day before, because I hadn’t wanted to wake Dutch when I’d snuck out of the house. As I drove, the moody sky turned even gloomier, and a slight drizzle began to fall, perfectly fitting my melancholy mood. So much seemed to be hanging over my head oppressively, and no matter how hard I worked to figure out why I was so unsettled, the answer seemed only to taunt me by scuttling even farther away.

  But what bothered me most of all was the feeling that I’d be walking down the aisle in four days and in my heart of hearts, I didn’t want to do it. I couldn’t pinpoint why, but every time I imagined myself in my gown, walking down those steps toward my fiancé with all those witnesses, I felt almost nauseated with anxiety.

  But I loved Dutch more than anyone in the world, and he wanted to marry me in front of his family and all of our friends (and my contacts list). I’d said yes to him when I accepted the beautiful emerald ring on my left ring finger, and my sister had planned and paid for the whole affair, so there was no going back on it now. Still, I felt that so much of my life was out of my control at the moment, and traditionally, when things get sticky, I tend to run. Or divert my attention by focusing on something else, like this case.

  And that was the other terribly troubling thing—all the oppressive, dreadful energy of the bombing case felt like it was growing tentacles, snaking its way into my life and ruining all that should be giving me great joy. I had an eerie premonition that my nuptials would somehow be wrecked by this case, and all I could think was that perhaps the next incident might take place on the day of the wedding. A cold shudder zipped down my spine, but also, something else. A connection, loose and gossamer thin, formed in my mind, and I wondered…

  Next to me a car honked and I jerked. I’d been drifting a little into the other lane. Shaking myself out of my dark thoughts, I focused on getting to the rental house in one piece. I pulled into the driveway and stared up at the house, which had been such a happy home. I’d liked living there, even though it wasn’t nearly as grand and luxurious as our new house promised to be.

  I headed inside as the gray clouds overhead thickened even more and the drizzle turned to rain. Once inside I flipped on the lights and saw that the bed was unmade, the sheets wound into knots. It appeared that Dutch had had a res
tless night too.

  I sat down on the bed and hugged his pillow, smelling his essence and missing him so terribly that I shed a few tears. After ten minutes of pity party and knowing Cat wouldn’t forgive me if I was late, I pulled myself together and gathered all my things, pausing in the doorway to say good-bye to a house that had been good to us, even if it’d been only temporarily.

  After putting all my things in the car, I had a thought and went back inside. Digging through my purse, I pulled out a pen and an old receipt and scribbled a love note to Dutch, leaving it on his pillow after straightening out the bed. He wouldn’t be sleeping here tonight, I knew, but he’d come back for the bed and his things at some point during the day.

  As I turned back toward the door again, it opened unexpectedly and there stood our landlord. “Do you knock?” I asked sharply before I could catch myself.

  He eyed me with surprise and irritation. “Sorry,” he said, in a way that clearly said he wasn’t. He then held out a check to me. “I saw your car and came to give you this.”

  I took the check and looked at it. It was enough for one day’s worth of rent. “Thanks,” I said, then eyed him expectantly. I wanted him to leave, but he was looking at the bed and the otherwise empty living room with interest. “You guys almost out?” he asked, and I knew he was thinking he could get a cleaning crew in here earlier.

  I sighed. “We agreed on the thirtieth, Bruce.”

  “Yeah, but if you’re already mostly moved out…,” he said.

  I glared at him. I wasn’t in the mood to be patient or cordial. “I have to go,” I said to him, and held my arm out toward the door. “If you don’t mind?”

  Bruce rolled his eyes and turned away from me. “Make sure your fiancé gets that check,” he said, like he fully expected me to use the money to go on a shopping spree at the dollar store and not tell Dutch about it.

  I ignored him and headed down the stairs on his heels, putting the pressure on him to get a move on. As he got in his car, he scoffed at me. Clearly we weren’t ever going to be buddies, but he did leave, which made me happy.