Fear No Evil (19 page)

Roger walked into the room Trask had converted into an office. “Sixty e-mails wanting to see Lucy. They’re not happy.”

“Sixty out of eighteen hundred seventeen paid viewers?”

“Sixty in fifteen minutes.”

Trask waved his hand. “They’ll get off watching Denise. Why aren’t you in there with her?”

Roger scratched his crotch. “I gave them a show. I’ll be back. How long do you want us to go at her?”

“At least an hour. That’ll keep these”—he tapped the stack of e-mails—“perverts jerking off.”

“Why’d you pull Lucy?”

“I have my reasons.” Not that he planned on sharing them with Roger. Roger had always told him Kate Donovan was a threat.
Give it up, pal. If you know where she is, go in and kill her. But don’t play games. She’s a wily bitch.

Kate Donovan was no threat. She was as weak and vulnerable as any woman on the face of the earth. Just more driven than most.

Trask would take care of her and enjoy every second. He’d imagined too often her neck in his hands and his cock in her cunt. She would know the moment before she died that she was nothing but a source of pleasure for him and him alone.

And then he’d crush her windpipe and watch those blue eyes freeze in death.

“Watch Mallory.”

“I always watch the new guys.”

“There’s something about him. He’s…off.”

“He checked out.”

“Are you questioning me? Again?”

“No,” Roger said slowly. “Why are you cutting me out? You messing around with Donovan again? Wait until after tomorrow night. We’re still getting new viewers, we’ll top two thousand by the last hour. I say we let everyone have a turn with her and then—”

“I’m the director,” Trask said, his voice low. “Is she locked up?”

“Tight.”

“Go back and fuck Denise. I have something to do.”

Roger left and Trask opened the drawer and stared at the photograph of his father in his judge’s robes. His face burned, remembering the humiliation this man had forced him to suffer.

Then he cut him off completely. His twenty-first birthday, cut off without one fucking dime.

His father was unforgiving. If only he’d had the courage to kill him before being disowned, everything would have gone to him when the bastard croaked.

“Look at me now, Father,” Trask said. “You rode on Mother’s bank account. You were nothing before you married that stupid woman. Just pathetic. I have money, millions. You cut me off, but I came back even stronger. If you were alive, you’d be paying me to watch my shows.”

His father was dead, and good riddance, but for once Trask wished he were alive. Just so Trask could turn the tables and do to him what he’d done to Trask.

Degrade and humiliate him. Hurt and abuse him.

But the bastard even stole that small pleasure from him.

Dillon couldn’t find Jack. Where had he gone? They didn’t have time for games, they needed to force Kate to talk. Dillon had a feeling Jack would be good at that.

If only Patrick were here. He could decipher her damn computer codes. She’d been working on something. Her demeanor, her tone, her body language said it all.

She’d lied to him. Dillon tolerated a lot, but he drew the line at lies.

He called Connor to find out how Patrick was doing.

“He’s still in a coma,” Connor said, his voice sounding surprisingly close. “We’re in San Diego and they’re prepping him for surgery.”

“Surgery?”

“Pressure on his brain. They need to relieve it or there’s no chance he’ll survive.”

Dillon paled. “Peterson didn’t tell me that.”

Connor sounded both angry and helpless. “Tell me you and that Donovan woman know where Lucy is. Tell me where. I’ll be there.”

“We’re working on it.”

“That’s not good enough!”

Dillon let Connor yell at him. Dillon wanted to scream himself. “I know,” he said quietly.

“Is Lucy…is she okay?”

“Yes.”

“Peterson just left to go back to headquarters. He said you had a list of names that this Trevor/Trask character may be.”

“It’s a theory.” Dillon filled Connor in, knowing that the process would comfort him.

“Call me when you find Lucy. Peterson has a plane fueled and ready at Miramar. It’s all ours. I can be flying anywhere in less than thirty minutes.”

“Call me when Patrick is out of surgery. How’re Mom and Dad holding up?”

“Mom’s in shock. Dad’s being steadfast.” Connor’s voice broke. “He cried when he saw Patrick. I haven’t seen him cry since Justin’s funeral.”

“I’m going to find her,” Dillon said.

Connor didn’t say anything.

“I will,” Dillon repeated.

“We have twenty-three hours. Time is running out.”

“Have faith.”
Have faith in me.

“When you get the coordinates send them to me. Don’t go after him yourself.”

Dillon tensed, rubbed his eyes. “I’ll send them to you, but I’m going.”

“You were right on the money about Kate Donovan and your profile of the bastard who took Lucy, but he’ll kill you. Fuck, Dil! I don’t know if Patrick is going to survive this surgery, but if they don’t go in he’ll definitely die. We can’t lose Patrick and Lucy and you.”

“I’ll call you. Tell Mom and Dad I love them.”

“Dil, you’re not—”

Dillon hung up. Connor was right. He had no business going after Trask and trying to save Lucy. He could end up dead, and Lucy would still die.

But sometimes brains beat out brawn. Sometimes knowing how the hunter thought, knowing what he felt, meant more than knowing how to kill him.

The more Dillon read of his file, the closer he got to understanding exactly who Trask was.

The man who had Lucy had been unusually bright and industrious from early childhood, quiet, focused, and studious. But because of his above-average intelligence, school bored him—even private school. He turned to challenging himself, probably by hacking into computers. Working with his hands. His parents were not involved with his day-to-day life, and he was an only child. If he had a sibling, that sibling was much older. That fit. Especially if the sibling had achieved a lot, been perfect in his parents’ eyes. He had big shoes to fill, and because he tended toward darkness even as a child, he messed up. He made mistakes and was punished for them. He was curious about his surroundings, so curious that he definitely got into trouble. Not with the law, but with his parents. Strict rules. Image. Wealth.

He thought back to his recent case where privileged teenagers killed for the thrill. Their parents were wealthy, focused on image and not the rules. In fact, the parents of the killing team had been emotionally distant and unconcerned about what their kids did—as long as they didn’t tarnish the family name.

Had Trask tarnished his family name? Had he made an unforgivable mistake in his parents’ eyes? Been disowned, like his friend Roger Morton?

Money was important to him. Hugely important. He thrived on moving money around, laundering it. He got a thrill out of making his fortune through the sex trade. Something that would embarrass his parents.

But he hadn’t used his real name.

Or had he?

Dillon needed to look back at those original files from Trask Enterprises. There was something there, and since Kate had interviewed virtually every employee, the answer was probably trapped in her brain.

As soon as he entered Kate’s room, he knew she was gone. Her
essence
had disappeared.

Along with her laptop, her backpack, and her PDA.

“Dammit, Kate!”

He picked up a piece of paper with his name on it.

Dillon—

I know you won’t understand, but please try. I can save Lucy, but only alone. You have no reason to trust me, but please, on this, you have to.

I won’t let you bury Lucy. If you have a chance to put flowers on my grave, I’ll know. If you curse me, I’ll understand.

Tell Lucy when she comes home that she’s the bravest woman I’ve ever seen and I wish I could have known her.

—Kate

She knew where Lucy was and was going after her alone. Damn her! Renegade? Maybe idiot was a better word.

Dillon ran from the room. “Jack!” he called, not knowing where his brother had gone, but figuring he’d be invaluable in tracking Kate in the middle of the night on this mountain. “Jack!”

“Over here.”

Jack was in a grove of short, stubby trees, doing what Dillon didn’t know, and at this point didn’t care. “Kate went after Trask. Dammit, I knew she was lying to me. Have you seen her? You’ve been all over this observatory. She has to have some sort of vehicle.”

“Vehicle? You could say that. She’s probably headed for the plane.”

“Plane?”
Dillon panicked. “We’ll never catch up to her in time.”

Jack pulled a large square device from his backpack. “She’s not going anywhere without this.”

“It looks like a car battery.”

“It goes to that fine little Stationair she has hidden about a mile away. The plane won’t fly without it.”

SEVENTEEN

K
ATE LOOKED AT HER CONTROLS
for the third time. What was wrong? She had fuel, but the plane just wouldn’t start. She had no power.

Damn, damn, damn! She had just checked the battery last week. It couldn’t be dead.

What was wrong with the damn plane?

The door opened. She swallowed when she saw Dillon Kincaid. She hadn’t thought him capable of fury, but his face said it all.

He’d never been as angry in his life.

He held the plane battery in his hands. “Looking for this?”

“Let me go.”

Dillon climbed into the turbocharged Cessna 206. He sat in the copilot seat, his tall frame filling the small cockpit.

“You are going to get Lucy and yourself killed. Maybe you deserve it. You think you do, so who am I to question it? But I will not have you getting Lucy killed in the process.”

“It’s not like that! He’ll kill her if he sees me with anyone—”

“You’ve been talking to him?” The words were quiet, but the fury vibrated in the plane. He dropped the battery at her feet.

“He contacted me. I told him if he pulled Lucy off-camera I would meet him. I’m trading myself for her! Don’t you see that this is the only way? One hint of the feds anywhere and he’ll kill her. I can’t risk it.”

Dillon grabbed her arms and lifted her from her seat. “You’re not stupid, Kate! You think he’s going to let Lucy go just because you walked into his lair? What are you thinking? You’ll both be killed and he’ll walk again! He wants you because you attacked his legitimate business. You embarressed him. He’s not going to give Lucy up. It’s a game to him. It’s fun. He wants to kill her.”

“I know things he doesn’t know I know.”

“Oh, for shit sake.” Dillon dropped her arms, leaned back into the seat, and held his head. “You’re a fool, Kate. You’re not going anywhere without me.”

Kate was trembling when she pulled the gun out of her vest pocket. “I’m sorry, Dillon. I don’t want to hurt you. Please leave my plane.”

“You’re going to shoot me and fly away? You wouldn’t.”

She nodded. “I’m not noble, Dillon. I’ll take justice any damn way I can get it. I’m already going to Hell. One more death isn’t going to change that.”

Dillon leaned forward. His green eyes burned. “But you’ve never killed anyone in cold blood.”

He snatched the gun from her hand. She couldn’t have been more surprised.

“Impressive.” Jack Kincaid stepped into the plane, sank into one of the two seats in the back. “I thought I’d have to intervene.”

“Shut up,” Dillon said.

“Don’t do this,” Kate whispered. “Please, I know what I’m doing.”

“Don’t talk to me right now. Just get this plane off the ground.”

Jack grinned, stretched his legs as best he could in the small craft, and put his left hand behind his head, his right hand holding a pistol loosely pointed at Kate.

She hated having the gun aimed at her, but she could hardly say anything. She’d had a gun on his brother.

“I’ll get a little shut-eye,” Jack said and closed his eyes, but Kate didn’t think they were really closed. “You two work out the details of the operation. Wake me when we get there.”

“No.” Kate shook her head. “No! You don’t understand!”

Dillon grabbed her chin, turned her to face him. She didn’t want to face his fury. He was too good for her. He wouldn’t compromise his soul. He wouldn’t kill in cold blood. And the only way to stop Trask was on his terms. Morals meant nothing. All that mattered was the end result.

Killing him.

She hadn’t believed men like Dillon Kincaid existed. Yet here he was, handsome and smart and angry at her. With very good reason.

She so badly wanted to trust him. But he was a novice—a shrink, for Pete’s sake—and not someone who could walk away from a gunfight. Jack Kincaid? Yeah, he might survive. But not Dillon.

Kate didn’t want his death on her conscience.

“Tell me exactly what’s going on,” Dillon said, voice low. “I will know if you’re lying.”

And he would. She had no doubt that he could see inside her mind.

“My trace program found his Internet server but I didn’t know it. He’s been tracking my every online move. He sent me a message, directing me to the proper time stamp in my program, and I saw the satellite route, traced it to a location northeast of Seattle, in the Cascade Mountains near Mount Baker.

“Then I received a secure transmission off the same feed. It gave me time and degrees—essentially, all the information I needed to determine longitude and latitude. I looked it up and the coordinates were eighty miles away from where Trask wanted me to meet him. An island, west of the rendezvous point, just north of the San Juan Islands on the Canadian/Washington border.”

“What game is he playing?” Dillon wondered out loud.

“It’s not a game. The information was coded using an FBI Academy code. Something only agents would know because we learned it at the Academy.