Hot Pursuit (4 page)

“Sounds good. Next case that comes up, you’re running point throughout.”

Ben knew he was grinning like an idiot again. He picked up the certificate that he’d laid on the couch next to him and stood. “I’m ready. More than ready.”

He laughed along with them and headed out. When he left the office and turned off the private road that ran along the beach and the exquisite homes that lined it, a silver Escalade pulled away from the curb and followed him. Ben went home, showered, then headed back out. He was going to celebrate, and he might even pick up some willing lady and bring her back to his place that night.

Three hours later Ben had given up on finding a lady but was doing a pretty good job at winning at pool. His phone vibrated, one short, one long, one short—meaning KFA was calling. He missed his shot.

“Damn it!” he cried out, and stepped away from the pool table. “Hey, man,” he said, turning to one of the regulars at the pool hall. “Stand in for me, will you? Work is calling.”

“Go catch the bad guys,” one of the girls who had been watching called out when she overheard him talking.

The rest of the crowd echoed her sentiments when Ben headed for the door. He waved over his shoulder and stepped out into the warm, dark night. Pulling his phone from his waist, he returned the missed call from the office.

“What’s up?” Ben asked, and sauntered toward his bike and away from the loud music bellowing from the bar.

“Sorry to interrupt your night.” Greg’s deep voice spoke crisply through the phone. “We have a situation.”

“What’s wrong?” Ben reached his bike and pulled his helmet free.

“Haley found a bug attached to the office door.”

It took Ben a moment to realize what Greg was talking about. Something hardened inside him. “Was it that Marley guy?”

“That’s what we’re thinking.”

“I can head over.” He was already straddling his bike. He’d text his buddies inside, but it wouldn’t be the first time he’d disappeared on them for work. Fortunately, they understood. “I can be there in ten minutes.”

“I ran a check on this Wolf Marley,” Greg went on, not commenting on what Ben had just said. By Greg’s tone he was in serious work mode. “He’s legitimate, a bounty hunter. He’s out of Oklahoma.”

“Oklahoma?” Ben asked incredulously. “What the hell is he doing here?”

“I think he’s doing exactly what he said he’s doing.”

There was silence between the two of them for a moment; then Ben said, “We didn’t give him any information, so he decided to try and get it on his own.”

“Yup,” Greg agreed. “According to my research on him, he drives a silver brand-new Escalade.”

Ben let out a low whistle. “He’s doing all right for himself.”

“Marley has an impeccable track record. He goes after the really huge bounties, something I’ve never had an interest in doing.”

“What do you mean by ‘really huge bounties’?”

“As in fugitives wanted by the United States government,” Greg said coldly. “And to date, he’s always got his man.”

The hardening in Ben’s gut twisted into an unpleasant knot, and bile rose to his throat. Something akin to panic built inside him. “He’s going after the Mulligan Stew assassin,” Ben whispered, and glanced around him at the dark, quiet parking lot. The only noise was the distant sound of music inside the bar.

“This guy is going to go to whatever extremes to gather any information he can. He bugged the office. Hard saying what else he might do. I don’t need you to come in,” Greg said finally. “But keep a close eye around your place.”

“My place?” Ben asked. “What would he want at my place?”

Suddenly he was sick. Marley wouldn’t know whether Ben had any contact with Micah or not.

“Where are you right now?” Greg asked.

“I went out for a few hours. I’ve been shooting some pool, celebrating a little.”

“So you haven’t been at your place?”

Ben understood without Greg saying anything. “I’m heading there now.”

Ben was home in record time and bounded up the stairs to his apartment. Lights from the parking lot shone on to the second-floor walkway and at the front of Ben’s apartment. His door didn’t appear tampered with, and he slid his key in the lock and unlocked it. Before he entered he spotted the edge of the screen to his living-room window. The side of it was bent outward slightly.

“Son of a bitch,” Ben hissed.

He rushed into his apartment, hitting the light switch and walking clear through to his kitchen, turning on all lights as he went. But he didn’t need every light to see the damage. His home had been ransacked. Ben picked the file and notebook off his floor that he’d been using to keep notes in preparation for getting his private investigator’s license.

“Goddamn it!” he roared, throwing the file and notebook at his wall.

Papers flew everywhere. He glared at his living room. Then, stalking into his bedroom, he glared at his open dresser drawers, the clothes strewn from his closet, and his mattress that had been slid sideways from the box spring.

“I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch,” he snarled, and his hands became fists at his sides.

He felt all of his muscles hardening. He’d been violated, his personal space ransacked. It was fucked up, and the asshole would pay.

Ben called Greg, and he and Haley were at Ben’s apartment in the next fifteen minutes.

“Have you touched anything?” Greg asked the moment he entered Ben’s apartment. Greg walked through the living room, taking in the damage as he glanced over everything.

“No, just stared at it and got more and more pissed.” Ben tried to sound civil, but the more he looked at his apartment the more he wanted to put a fist through the wall.

“Listen to me,” Greg said calmly, almost too calmly. He came around and stood in front of Ben, facing him.

“What?” Ben should be cool with his boss, but this was too much. Somehow he’d find that Marley bastard and put his head through a wall.

“When someone does this,” Greg said, and gestured at the damage in the living room with his hand. “Obviously they are looking for something.”

“Obviously,” Ben muttered.

Greg sighed and tilted his head. He stood several inches taller than Ben but had never come across as intimidating. “I know you’re pissed,” he said under his breath. “I was livid when I realized he’d bugged the office. He might have bugged your place, too.”

Ben noticed for the first time that Haley was setting up some equipment she and Greg had brought with them. “If he did,” Ben grumbled.

Greg put his hand on Ben’s shoulder. “Chill for a moment. We’ll sweep the place and see what we find.”

Haley began running what looked like a small metal detector through Ben’s living room. She walked through every room in his apartment, stepping over anything that the asshole had tossed on the floor.

“Nothing,” she said after sweeping floors, walls, and everything in between.

“Here’s the deal,” Greg said immediately, his hand once again on Ben’s shoulder as he leaned into him. “When someone breaks in to look for something there are certain methods every perp follows, unless he’s exceptionally good. Our guy is a bounty hunter, not a burglar. We’re going to start under the presumption that he’s going to act like a million other people when they enter someone’s house to find something.”

“Okay,” Ben said slowly.

“First,” Greg began, gesturing with his hand. “We don’t touch the condition of the property—”

“I didn’t,” Ben interrupted.

“We take a look at it as is,” Greg continued, and straightened next to Ben. He continued looking around as he walked through the apartment. “Is there a room that appears more disturbed than other areas?”

“You’re joking, right?” Ben also glanced around his trashed bedroom, then looked at Greg incredulously.

Greg faced Ben. “No. I’m serious. Look at your room again. Don’t see the intrusion, the personal violation, and let go of your anger. Take a look at this room again and this time remember how it was when you left and try to find any area where he spent more time.”

“Meaning something there appealed to him.” Ben got it. He looked away from Greg again and focused on his bedroom.

Haley managed her way around Ben through the limited space at the end of his bed and his dresser. Ben stared at the bed. Marley had lifted the mattress to look underneath it, didn’t find anything, and dropped it. He didn’t bother straightening it. He was in too much of a hurry. Ben pictured the guy going to Ben’s closet next. Marley opened the door, stared at the few hanging clothes, didn’t see anything there, and went to the floor of the closet. He pulled out the few pieces of clothing there, which were actually Ben’s dirty clothes, and didn’t find anything. Once again, Marley didn’t bother putting anything back. He wanted to be in and out of the apartment as quickly as possible. He wouldn’t know for sure when Ben would return. Marley pulled out Ben’s dresser drawers, found most of them were damn near empty, and turned his attention to the top of the dresser. Everything that had once been on the top of the dresser was now on the floor.

The top of the dresser.

Ben bent down and started to pick up the items on the floor.

“Remember to not touch anything,” Greg said. “If we have to call this in, I won’t have an earful of how we compromised the crime scene.”

There were good and bad aspects of Greg being an ex-cop. The good obviously was he had pointed out how to look at a trashed room. The bad was how the hell was Ben going to confirm his fears if he couldn’t touch anything?

“Then I need gloves or something,” Ben complained.

Haley laughed. “It’s your apartment. What do you have here?”

Ben muttered under his breath, stood, found a pen that was still on top of his dresser, then squatted and pushed things out of the way to look at the items on the floor. He was overly aware of both Greg and Haley bending over to see exactly what he was doing.

There was no getting out of telling them. His behavior had alerted them, and if he told them he wasn’t looking for anything, they wouldn’t believe him. Ben had never lied to either one of them yet.

“There was a postcard,” he began, speaking under his breath.

“A postcard,” Haley repeated.

“From whom?” Greg demanded.

Ben sighed and stood. “There was nothing written on it.”

Both Greg and Haley looked at him.

Ben gestured to the living room. “I’ll show you.”

They returned to the living room, and Ben remembered he’d hurled his notes and file against the wall when he’d first gotten home. Turning in a slow circle to see all the papers that had flown out of the file on the floor, Ben ignored Greg and Haley when they sidestepped to get out of his way.

“What are you showing us?” Greg asked.

“The other postcard,” Ben began. When he straightened and fought the anger that built inside him once again, faster and harder than it had the first time, he added through gritted teeth, “That isn’t here, either. That lousy motherfucker took the postcards. I’m going to catch him and kill him.”

“Okay, calm down.” Haley was probably the only person on the planet who didn’t mind putting her hand on the chest of a seething man without blinking an eye. Possibly being married to a man who was six and a half feet tall and having given birth to two boys who had turned into men both at least that tall had made her immune. “When you find him, you can get pissed. Right now tell us what you’re talking about with these postcards.”

Ben stared at her a moment and saw understanding in her eyes. Before he had even finished the thought of chasing down the asshole, Haley already voiced that she knew he was leaving to go after Marley.

“What are you talking about?” she whispered, and dropped her hand to her side.

“I’ve received two postcards since he left.” Ben stared at Haley.

She stared back at him and a second passed before she mouthed the word,
Oh.

“They went through the mail?” Greg asked.

“Got them in my mailbox.” Ben nodded. “They were postmarked so I could tell what town they were mailed from, but nothing was written on either one. One of them was buried under a few things on my dresser. I got it a while back. The second one showed up about a month ago. On the day it showed up I was getting paperwork ready for my PI license so I stuck it in the folder along with those papers. I never took it back out. Both are gone.”

“He was touching base,” Greg muttered, and stared across the living room.

Ben didn’t say anything but agreed. Micah had made contact with him, and Ben had a general idea where he was, or at least where he had been when the postcards were mailed.

“And now Marley has those postcards,” Haley grumbled.

“I’m going after him.”

Both Haley and Greg looked at Ben.

He raised his hands in the air in surrender. “I know. You already guessed as much,” he said. “I’ve worked my ass off and jumped over more hurdles than most trying to get my license so I could be a full-fledged bounty hunter. And now I can be one.” There was no way he could explain how indebted he was to Micah. Without the money Micah had left for Ben his life wouldn’t be the way it was right now. “I can’t let that asshole find Micah and turn him in,” Ben whispered. “I know I’d be leaving you two with no one—”

“Don’t worry about that. In this line of work we don’t always get to choose when we stay home and when we’re off on a hunt.” Greg put his arm around Haley and hugged her against his side. “We’ve been talking about slowing down a bit. We just hadn’t decided when to do it. Looks like we don’t get to choose when that happens, either, but now is as good a time as any.”

Haley looked up at her husband, then at Ben. “We had talked about doing some traveling. Go see our son out in Colorado, and our niece up in Northern California. I’ve always wanted to go to Alaska.”

“Her California blood won’t be able to handle that for a minute,” Greg muttered. “Go find Micah.”

“We know you can find him,” Haley reassured, that motherly look she got sometimes appearing on her face. “And don’t think for a minute you have to play it tough all the time. We’re a phone call away.”

“A smart man knows when it’s time to brainstorm and bounce ideas or thoughts off someone else,” Greg said.