Omens (48 page)

“Would you sit down?” I said. “Please.”

He hesitated, then lowered himself to the sheets. “We need Chandler. He’s out there.”

“Out where?”

A wave, curt, almost annoyed. “Out there. Watching.”

I shook my head. “He phoned in his instructions to Maria. I saw the call display. He’s sitting at home, orchestrating all this.”

“It was a cell phone. He’s here. Keeping his distance but keeping control.”

“How do you know that?”

Another flash of annoyance. Or maybe just pain. “Because I know what kind of man he is. He’s here, and I would like you to get the hell out that window, so I can go find him.”

I cast a pointed look at his leg. “Really?”

He grabbed a sheet and tore off a strip to bind it. “I’ll be fine.”

“Okay, so if I won’t leave, I’m being stupid. If you insist on taking down Chandler when you can barely stand, you’re being brave?”

“Olivia…”

“How about we call him. See what’s what.” I lifted my phone.

“I have his home number, not his cell.”

“I saw it on the call display.”

“And you remember it?”

“Of course. I’m playing detective. The area code was 817. Is that his home number?”

He checked. “No.”

I started to dial.

“No,” he said, rising. “Let me—”

I shook my head. “I’m the client, remember?”

“I thought you were my partner.”

“It varies depending on which best suits my needs.”

“As either your lawyer or your partner, I believe I should be privy to your plan.”

I told him. He adjusted it. I would have argued on one point, but there wasn’t time.

When I called, Chandler’s cell rang a few times—I didn’t expect him to answer an unknown number. Then it went to voice mail.

“Hello, Dr. Chandler,” I said. “This is…” I paused. Considered. “Eden Larsen. We need to talk.”

C
handler listened to the message. Then he smiled. He could hear the desperation in the girl’s voice, in the way she’d hesitated, barely able to get the words out. She’d kept her tone clear, trying to be brave, but she was trapped and she knew it. She wanted to negotiate. How quaint.

He summoned Anderson first. Then he phoned the girl back. She answered on the first ring.

“Miss Larsen,” he said. “Is that the name you use now?”

“It is.”

He gave a soft chuckle. “All right. Let’s talk. By that, I presume you mean negotiate.”

“I might.”

He strained to pick up noise that might suggest where she was hiding. “Admirable, but under the circumstances I don’t think you have anything to negotiate
with
.”

“Then you wouldn’t have returned my call. Technology is amazing, isn’t it? We don’t have to play cat and mouse, blindly groping around unable to communicate. Likewise, I don’t need to play that old ruse where I say I have details of your crimes locked in a safe, to be opened in the event of my death. I can just tell you that I have it right here, in an e-mail, complete with photos of what happened in this house.”

He tried not to pause. He wasn’t concerned, of course. He’d cleaned up worse messes than this. Still, it annoyed him that he hadn’t considered this possibility. He’d been out of the game too long.

He glanced at Anderson, coming out into the yard now. That reminded him what he was supposed to be doing—not chatting with the girl, but using background noise to pinpoint her location. Just keep her talking. She seemed willing enough.

“And Mr. Walsh himself?” Chandler asked.

“Dead, I think. Or dying. Your bodyguard shot him in the thigh. He seemed all right, but after running through the house, I think that bullet nicked the femoral artery. There’s a lot of blood. He might still be alive. I can’t tell. But if he is, I’d suggest you fix that when you get a chance. Otherwise, you’ll need to bargain with both of us, and he’s a much tougher negotiator.”

“So I’ve heard.”

By God, she was a cold one. Last night, she’d been ready to shoot him to save Walsh. But the moment her lawyer became more burden than help, she’d let him die. Not surprising, given where she came from. He understood now why the Huntsmen had forbidden him to simply remove her from the equation. The restriction rankled, but he dared not defy them. That was beyond dangerous.

The girl continued, “I’m sure your plan isn’t to leave me alive, either. Actually, I’m surprised you let me live this long. You knew I was digging for answers. You could have killed me. Instead, you had brainwashed assassins kill Niles Gunderson and Joshua Gray before I could get to them. That seems … complicated.”

She paused. When she did, he heard the faint sound of a furnace turning on, warming the cool morning. Furnace meant basement.

He motioned to Anderson and mouthed “basement.” The bodyguard lumbered off.

Chandler realized the line had stayed quiet. “Miss Larsen?”

“You’re not even going to pretend you have no idea who I’m talking about?”

Chandler inwardly cursed. He’d been paying too much attention to that furnace to react properly to her accusation about Gunderson and Gray. He should deny it, and yet … Well, he hadn’t gotten to where he was by doing what he should. Especially when that instinct to deny was really just his old CIA training. It worked most times, but a smart and independent man also had to know when to give a little. Just a little.

“I know who Mr. Gunderson is,” he said carefully. “And I know that Mr. Gray contacted Will, who called me about it. He was concerned. I told him to take care of it. Naturally, I only meant for him to speak to Mr. Gray, and if he did more, that’s regrettable, but hardly my fault.”

“It was Evans who wanted to get close to me, wasn’t it? You disagreed—like when you disagreed with how he wanted to handle Peter’s discovery.”

“That was unfortunate.” Chandler paused. Play the string out a little and then stop it short. Keep the fish on the line while the shark moved in. “I didn’t kill Peter, though. Again, I merely told Will to take care of it. When I learned of the deaths, I confronted Will. I knew what had happened. They’d argued and there was an accident. The girl came in. Will panicked and killed her. He denied it, but the fact that he staged the scene to look like the work of your parents sealed the matter.”

“How?”

“My dear girl. You do know his field of expertise, do you not? Sociopaths. He followed the murders very closely. Even discussed it with friends on the police force, which is how he knew details that were never made public. He was fascinated by sociopathy. Which is why he was fascinated by you.”

A moment of silence as she worked it out. “Because I could, potentially, be what MKULTRA was searching for. The perfect assassin. I have the genes but not the experience. I’m a blank slate for his experiments. And I’m not currently serving a life sentence.”

“That is an advantage.”

“You let him build a relationship with me, because you were intrigued by his theories. You still are.”

“Possibly. Is that what you’re offering Miss Larsen? Yourself as a guinea pig?”

“Not sure I have much choice.” She went quiet for a moment. “You said Evans denied it. But he ultimately confessed?”

Chandler hesitated only a split-second before smoothly lying. “Yes, he confessed. To me, acting as his doctor, not his friend, though, which meant I wasn’t at liberty to reveal it. With his death, that changes. I have proof—”

A gunshot sounded in the basement.

“What the—?” She shrieked. “You—you bastard!”

Chandler smiled. “Calm down, Miss Larsen.”

“I’m negotiating with you in good faith, you son of a bitch, and you sent your lackey down here to shoot me. All I have to do is hit the send button. It only takes
one
second.”

“It was a mistake,” he said smoothly. “I told him—”

“Call him off! If I see his face, I will send this e-mail. I swear it.”

The line went dead.

I
hung up. Then I opened the door and peered out. Gabriel was crouched by the foot of the stairs. He waved me over.

As I headed to the steps, a phone started to ring. It came from the body sprawled at the bottom of the stairs. Anderson. Unconscious. Blood seeped from the back of his head. Judging by the way his hair stuck up on one side, I guessed Gabriel had grabbed him by it and cracked his head against the concrete. There was more blood on the steps. Bits of shoe, too. And flesh.

I looked over at Anderson’s foot. It was a bloody mess, half of it blown off.

“How’d you manage that?” I whispered to Gabriel.

“I waited behind the stairs and shot his foot through the risers as he came down.”

“Smart.” I looked around. “Messy, though.”

“It’s a big gun.”

Anderson’s phone had stopped ringing. Mine started.

I answered and said to Chandler, “You’ve called him off?”

A hesitation, then, “Yes, of course. I’m sorry about that, Miss Larsen. I—”

“Whatever. Now, let’s negotiate. I want— What the hell? I thought you said you—”

On cue, Gabriel fired his gun. I dropped the phone and fired my own gun, aiming somewhere across the basement. Then I hit the floor, groaning.

“Miss Larsen?” Chandler called from the fallen phone.

I stopped groaning.

“Anderson?”

Silence. Then a curse. I could still hear Chandler’s breathing, quickening now, as buttons clicked. He hung up. Anderson’s phone began to ring.

I winced as I rubbed my shoulder. “I need to work on my pratfalls.”

Gabriel motioned for me to save the commentary and play dead. I did, lying on my back, gun gripped in my hand. Gabriel crossed the room, his left foot dragging now, breath coming ragged. How badly
was
he hurt? Too badly to play this game much longer.

Too badly to finish it?
I hoped not. Really hoped not.

A few minutes later, the basement door creaked open. A long pause. I imagined Chandler peering through. A curse as he saw Anderson’s fallen body. Then a louder one as he saw me lying several feet away. He started down the steps. I counted them off.

Four, five, six…

“Stop,” Gabriel said. He didn’t bark it. Barely even raised his voice. Just a calm and steady, “Stop.”

I sat up, gun aimed.

“You know the routine,” I said. “Drop the gun. Don’t bother backing away this time. Just drop it over the side of the steps.”

He paused. Then he started to raise his gun. Gabriel fired, the bullet passing close enough to make Chandler lose his footing and tumble down the stairs, gasping, gun falling.

“Or we can do it like that,” I said as I walked over to where he lay, moaning as he struggled to get up. “I’d stay down there. I’m sure you broke something. The cops are on their way, and lucky for you, they’re bringing an ambulance. Unluckily, yours will be going straight to a prison hospital.”

Chandler managed to sit, grimacing at the pain. “You don’t want to do that, Miss Larsen.”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure I do.”

“No, you do not. You have no idea what you’ve gotten involved with. What you’ve stirred up. I can help you.”

“Right. Let me think about that … No.”

“You’re a child,” he said. “A silly little girl who has mistaken being glib for being clever.” He turned to Gabriel. “There’s opportunity here, boy. I’ve heard you appreciate opportunity.”

Gabriel didn’t reply.

“At least hear me out,” Chandler said. “Call the police and tell them it was a mistake. Listen to my offer—”

“Like Ms. Jones, I am not interested.”

“Then you are a fool, boy.”

“Perhaps.” Gabriel glanced up at the door above and I heard faint voices. “I believe we have company. Olivia? It’s best if a woman’s voice hails them.”

Before I could shout, Chandler grabbed my ankle. I kicked him off and backed away.

“Reconsider, Miss Larsen,” he said. “You have no idea what you’ve—”

“We’re down here!” I shouted. “In the basement.”

“We should back out of their line of fire,” Gabriel said, raising his voice to be heard over Chandler’s protests and proclamations of doom.

We moved to the side and readied our guns, just in case whoever was at the door wasn’t who we’d invited. But when it opened, it was indeed the police. We lowered our weapons to the floor and lifted our hands.

“You’ve made a very big mistake, Miss Larsen,” Chandler hissed as Gabriel shouted up an explanation. “Do you think Cainsville will protect you?”

I glanced over sharply. “Cainsville? What does Cainsville have to do with—?”

“You’ll find out.” Chandler smiled. “The hounds will come to Cainsville and when they do, you’ll wish you’d made a very different choice today.”

It wasn’t long after the police arrived before I did begin to wish I hadn’t been so quick to call them. When you’re trapped in a basement with gun-wielding mind-controlled assassins at every turn, it’s easy to think,
Damn the consequences—just get me out of here!
The consequence, as it turns out, was that the daughter of Pamela and Todd Larsen had been found in a house full of dying people.

Within about fifteen minutes, I was convinced I’d be joining my parents in jail. That’s as long as it took for the paramedics to wrap Gabriel’s leg, and for him to hobble back and handle things for me.

The evidence was clearly on my side. We’d documented every step, including taping my conversation—I’d put Chandler on speaker and recorded with Gabriel’s phone. We hadn’t touched the trigger of the gun that killed Evans, leaving only Maria’s fingerprints. We expected to find drugs in my coffee, further supporting my story. And there were no actual deaths to lay at our feet. Mrs. Evans, the gardener, and Anderson were still alive. Even Maria had survived—for now, though she was being rushed into surgery in critical condition. Mrs. Evans and the gardener had no idea what was going on, and I was sure tests would reveal drugs in their systems, too. As for Anderson, he’d started ratting out his boss the minute he woke up to find himself with half a foot.

Still, it was messy. Really messy. And we weren’t even saying the words “mind control,” instead sticking with “they seemed to be drugged.” We weren’t mentioning Niles Gunderson and Josh Gray, either. If Anderson wanted to pin those on his boss, that was his choice; we wouldn’t muddy the waters.