Die for Me (5 page)

She felt as if she stood on the edge of an abyss and another tendril of excitement snaked its way through her body. Endless possibilities presented themselves in a matter of seconds. With a hit man at her side, she’d never have to answer to anyone again.

That’s not why you’re doing this,
her mother’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

Torrhent reminded herself of the matter at hand. Her mother’s bracelet lay at the bottom of that pack, and if LAPD hadn’t catalogued it yet, she could get it back. “I need the bag.”

Harrington’s attention was focused elsewhere, further down the wall. “See that window?”

She followed his gaze and chuckled. “Yeah. It’s a little small for you, isn’t it?”

“I’m not the one going through it.” An amused expression came over his face.

“We’re three stories up!” she exclaimed.

“Not my problem. You wanted out. I’m getting you out. Now tell me why Isaac Rutler sent his bodyguard for a woman named Adelaide Banvard.”

The guard on the floor shifted, moans escaping his throat in small, helpless gasps.

“Better get moving, sweetheart.” Harrington stared at her expectantly as anxiety clawed up her throat.

She tried to swallow it down, tried to hold back the tears pressing at the corners of her eyes. That bracelet was the only thing she had left of her mother. She couldn’t just leave it behind. “I’m not leaving without my bag!”

Just then the door opened again, but it wasn’t the police.

Torrhent recognized the man from the convenience store and again in the café, her gut sinking with her own stupidity. They weren’t working together at all. The weight of her realization pressed against her chest, making it hard to breathe. She’d picked the wrong hit man.

She backed toward the window.

“I think you’re leaving without your bag.” Harrington had already seen the new arrival, his shoulders tensing as he turned to face him. “Get out of here.”

A gun appeared in the stranger’s hand, aiming straight for her. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. Her body wouldn’t obey the commands her mind gave it.

Harrington yelled at her, but she couldn’t understand a single word.

Something exploded on the wall next to her, sharpening her senses. Everything suddenly seemed louder. Torrhent threw herself to the floor as a second and third bullet whizzed past. A hand wrapped around her arm, pulling her upright and shoving her against the wall. His grip hurt, but she couldn’t focus on that right now. “Get the hell out of here!”

The window caught her eye. It offered freedom, and every instinct in her body screamed for her to run. She bolted toward it and, as Torrhent climbed out onto the third-story ledge of the county jail, she left John Harrington to fend for himself.

Chapter 4

A bullet ripped through Taigen’s arm as he went for the gun.

It hurt.

A lot.

Slamming his elbow into the shooter’s face, Taigen wrenched the gun from the guy’s hand. The gun flew across the floor, lost but not forgotten. His old life returned with each blow delivered and it felt good. Years of training flowed through his veins freely as adrenaline pushed his heart rate higher. Automatic reflexes took over, small at first. He blocked an oncoming attack to his kidneys, but failed to protect his face.

The pain splintering from temple to jaw pulled a growl from his throat, but awakened the assassin he’d buried. The secret side he’d kept caged reared its ugly head, lingering just beneath his skin. He hated what he’d become and had worked night and day to control his disease.

Until now.

Like pulling off a jacket, his body sank into the familiar motions. With a single swipe behind his attacker’s knee, Taigen put his attacker on the floor. He finished him off with a downward hit to the face. Then another. God, he missed being in control.

The fight ended and he stood above the incapacitated shooter as he struggled to put the inner hit man back in its cage. His sister had never been able to master the expulsion of her demon, but he’d become an expert over the years. Then again, his abilities landed on the mild side compared to Adelaide’s. Inhaling slowly, Taigen focused on saving his twin rather than what he could do with his bare hands. “You work for Rutler.”

It was the only explanation.

“I won’t tell you shit.”

Taigen squatted in front of his attacker, his knees cracking under the pressure. “You don’t have to.” He clenched his fingers into the man’s clothing, ripping him off the floor. The officer who’d intervened earlier lay motionless. A puddle of blood pooled beneath his body, and Taigen hoped they found him soon. “You don’t seem to understand the situation. If I don’t find him, nobody will get out of this alive. So I’m going to ask nicely—”

The door at the end of the hall burst open. “Freeze!”

Taigen kept his hands around the shooter, avoiding any sudden movements. “Agent Trullio,” he greeted, recognizing her from her interviews. “I wondered when you’d show up.”

She walked toward him slowly, gun drawn, aimed at his head. Trullio pushed long blonde hair out of her face. Thin, somewhat pretty, Agent Trullio was all business. The hard edge in her expression and the fiery look in her eyes told Taigen she wouldn’t make this easy. This one had a few more years on her than most recruits her age.

“Release him and step away.” She bent to the floor carefully, keeping her eyes and gun trained on them as she collected the shooter’s gun. Two officers followed in after the agent. LAPD.

He did as he was told, his fingers cramping from the grip he had on the shooter.

Agent Trullio stood only five feet away. “Mr. Pelt,” she greeted the shooter. “You’ve been on our watch list for a long time. But you”—the gun moved with her address toward Taigen—“I don’t know you.”

Taigen didn’t answer.

“Playing the strong, silent type won’t get you anywhere with me,” she said. “What’s your name?”

The two LAPD officers moved behind him. One took his attacker’s wrists behind his back and Taigen let the other manhandle him into a pair of cuffs. The click of the metal locking in place rang in his ears. He’d been arrested before. No surprises there. He tested the cuffs’ strength. Designed as temporary restraints, they weren’t impossible to escape from, but Taigen would play nice for now. Agent Trullio could help him in the long run.

“John Harrington.” The alias was clean and he didn’t mind burning through it. John Harrington had done his job. He’d let her have fun with the name for a while. In the meantime, he’d keep himself in check and gather as much information from her as he could.

“Well, Mr. Harrington, you’re under arrest.”

“What for?”

“To start with,” she said, her eyes gazing into the cell beside them, “I have a convicted felon missing and you two are my only witnesses.” A closed-lipped smile crept across her face. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Agent Trullio hadn’t said a word in thirty minutes. He assumed she wanted him to talk first, but he’d had more practice with the silent game than she ever could. Learning to wait came with having a troubled sister.

“How long are we going to sit here until you tell me your side of the story, Mr. Harrington?” She’d broken first, but Taigen didn’t feel the victory yet. “But that’s not your real name, is it?”

“You tell me.”

Her soft chuckle barely echoed around one of LA county jail’s many interrogation rooms. The cinder-block walls, concrete floor, single table and two chairs making up the small space weren’t meant to be comfortable. Most suspects and witnesses didn’t stay more than a couple hours on any given day.

Taigen would stay even less.

“Well, I don’t really care who you are, Mr. Harrington. I just want to know what happened to my prisoner.” Agent Trullio slid a photo across the table from the file in front of her. “Everything else is just a waste of my time. So tell me, did you see Ms. Lynd leave the cell?”

He studied the photo of Torrhent Lynd. Idly, he wondered how she’d escaped from Bedford. A woman with no apparent experience for stealth or strength would need help with such a risk. Taigen picked up the photo, hoping to get some kind of clue to who he was dealing with. “The news says she killed the leader of the underground MMA organization, but not how she did it.”

“Just answer my question, Mr. Harrington.” Agent Trullio took the photo from him, holding it in front of his face. “Did you see this woman leave her cell?”

“Yes.”

Trullio put the picture back in the file and picked up a pen. She wrote on the pad beside her then raised her eyes to his. “Did you see her attack the guard?”

“No.”

“And what were you doing there?”

Taigen inhaled slowly as he carefully weighed his options. He didn’t have much time to find Torrhent, certain she’d already tried to leave the city. Someone like her, with no training or skills in his line of work, would be easy to find. For anybody looking for her. Depending on the next few seconds, he’d either end up with a twin bullet in his chest, as a new resident in the county jail, or as a free man. “Because I’m the one who broke her out.”

Trullio stopped writing. “Excuse me?”

He motioned to her pen and pad. “I broke her out. Don’t you want to write that down?”

“Why?”

“Well, don’t you need it for evidence of something?”

“Why did you break her out?” Her voice grew hard as she dropped the pen. Her right hand went below the table, presumably for the 9mm holstered on her left side under her jacket. Trullio’s entire body tensed, but Taigen’s settled deeper into the chair.

He’d learned the trick to any lie was to include kernels of truth. The story he’d rehearsed left his lips easily, slivers of truth tinting the outright lie. “That guy you called Pelt was sent to kill her. I broke her out to prevent him accomplishing his goal. She climbed out the window when he came in.”

“You know Ms. Lynd then?”

“Not more than anyone else has seen on TV.”

“All right.” Agent Trullio sat back in her chair, arms across her chest. Her right hand remained close to her jacket’s opening, giving Taigen the impression yet again she was far more qualified than her age suggested. Her eyes narrowed. She leaned forward, her elbows resting on the cold metal of the table. She dropped her voice. “Did her stepfather send you to finish the job?”

The second step of his plan began to slip into place. “If he did, do you think I’d admit to it?”

Trullio studied him long and hard, but Taigen refused to buckle under the pressure of her gaze. “You know, for the past twenty minutes I’ve been fighting the sense that you look familiar.”

“Really?” It was Taigen’s turn to lean over the table, and he wasn’t surprised when Agent Trullio remained in place. He’d hooked her, now to reel her in. “My name is Taigen Banvard, born August 17, 1981, in Las Vegas, Nevada, to Daniel Banvard and Amelia Blake. Mother dead. Father recently dead. Twin sister, convicted serial killer, Adelaide Banvard, escaped from Twin Towers Correctional two years ago.”

The last part nearly cost him his control. The interrogation room suddenly became too small. Heat licked up his neck, but he kept his breathing in check. Shame, guilt and even regret consumed him in an instant. As if a physical weight had been placed on his chest, Taigen couldn’t breathe. His sister had done horrible things. Torture. Murder. Mostly men. Guilty, but not all. He hadn’t been there for her when she needed him the most and he certainly hadn’t ever told anyone about her. He inhaled slowly to calm his racing heart as he leveled his eyes at Agent Trullio’s. “Does that help?”

Her sharp inhale indicated her fear and Taigen pushed back from the table. “Why would you tell me that?”

He shrugged, the bullet in his chest making it hard. “Maybe I’m tired of lying to everyone around me.”

Trullio nodded, her blonde hair slinking over her shoulder with the movement. “Adelaide Banvard is number one on the most wanted list. So what’s your angle here?”

Trullio turned out to be highly more inquisitive than he’d planned. He had to get her out of the room. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know on one condition.”

“What is that?” Light danced behind her eyes and Taigen imagined all the possibilities running through her head. Surely, one with her abilities wanted a promotion. Perhaps the patriarchal design of the agency limited her from reaching it. With his sister in FBI custody, the director himself would extend a welcoming hand to her.

“Coffee.”

An exasperated sigh left her lips. “Fine,” she answered. Agent Trullio collected her file then rose. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

The door closed with a click behind her and Taigen discarded the cuffs they’d used to arrest him onto the floor. Dropping the mutilated paper clip from Trullio’s file onto the floor, he stood and walked directly toward the one-way glass. His reflection stared back at him, but segments of the room beyond filtered through with a working overhead light. Nobody on the other side.

Taigen raised his eyes to the top of the mirror then farther, to the ceiling. A single vent offered him freedom, but he’d have to work fast. Agent Trullio wasn’t one to fool around when it came to getting what she wanted.

The table had been bolted to the floor away from the vent, but the chairs hadn’t. The difference in height wouldn’t be a problem. Positioning Agent Trullio’s vacant chair beneath the vent, Taigen laced his fingers between the vent’s folds and pulled. The cover dropped open with a creak. He gripped the edges of the opening, jumping off the chair as he hoisted himself into the two-by-two hole with all his strength. Taigen exhaled loudly once he collapsed into the square metal tube, his muscles screaming from misuse. Carefully pulling the vent door closed, Taigen waited in silence as the interrogation room door swung open.

“Mr. Banvard, about Torrhent—” Agent Trullio dropped the coffee in her hands, swinging back into the hallway. “Lock down this building!”

Taigen pushed his body farther into the innards of the shafts. The floor plans he’d studied before stepping into the building had burned themselves into his mind. He followed his route closely, stopping every now and then when voices traveled to his ears from directly below.

All he needed was an empty office.

Footsteps echoed up into the vent as officers and administration alike searched for him. Two escapes in one day; not a good rate for LAPD. Taigen slithered on his belly like a snake toward another opening that blazed with artificial light.
Bingo
. Staring down into the office, he listened for a few seconds longer to ensure it had been abandoned.

He pushed the grate down and stuck his head through the opening. No sign of occupancy. His body followed, landing soundlessly on top of a hardwood desk. A few papers crumbled under his weight, but Taigen didn’t pay them much attention. He lowered himself onto the floor, keeping his attention on the closed door in case someone came back. He took a seat in front of the desktop computer and relief bubbled to the surface of his locked-down emotions. The owner of the computer hadn’t bothered to lock their computer on their way out.

Taigen pulled up the national database and typed in Rutler’s name. The photo on his New York driver’s license showed a man in his late forties. Hard expression, blue eyes, suit. Nothing more. Another page gave a little more information. Born in Detroit, Michigan. Both high school and college degrees. Mother and father both dead; murder-suicide. Married for sixteen years to wife, Charlie Lynd, now deceased over a year from a mugging in New York City.

He clicked through a handful of crime scene photos.

The profile didn’t say anything about Rutler’s extracurricular activities in the underground MMA fighting ring, but if Taigen had been a betting man, he’d place his money on the wife’s murder as payback. The knife wounds on the late Mrs. Rutler’s body were delivered by a professional. The internal jugular had been punctured, effectively draining blood from the brain rather than the face. Quick, fifteen seconds tops, but not painless. They’d wanted her to suffer, to gasp for air through waves of her own blood.

She’d been found alone, but Taigen doubted a man such as Rutler would have let his wife wander the streets of New York by herself. Too many risks. No, he’d have assigned a bodyguard to her, maybe even his own personal bodyguard. Whoever it’d been, they’d failed, leaving Rutler without a wife and Torrhent Lynd without a mother.

Voices in the hall tore Taigen’s gaze from the computer, but something in the back of his mind told him Rutler was looking to upgrade his personal security. Adelaide made a formidable bodyguard, as Christian Wren discovered. Nobody could get past her, but it was only a matter of time before Adelaide’s inner monster turned her employers into targets.

* * *

A ripple of fear shimmered up her spine and lingered at the base of her neck. Torrhent felt as if dozens of eyes were on her, looking for the best way to take her by surprise. Or it could just be her paranoia.