Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“I would have told you two, but it just happened.” Jane didn’t know why she had to keep apologizing. The guys had let her sleep it off the night before, but Thursday afternoon, they expected details on everything.
“Okay, Joe’s being a little pushy.” Hal gave him a look that seemed to calm Joe down. Joe could get super protective, but that was part of what Jane loved about him. He very much put family first. “But we’re concerned. We had to hear from Raine about your assassination attempt at the gas station.”
“They didn’t send an assassin after me. But he worked for the Mazzucas.
And I’m not sure those events were connected, but that wasn’t too long after my near run-down at the bar.
But again,” she said hurriedly before Joe interrupted, “I couldn’t be certain that was tied to the Mazzucas.
I’m still not. Though I am wondering if maybe Scott had something to do with the gas station.
Are you sure you can’t find anything tying him to the Mazzucas? ”
Jane still secretly wondered if her fixation on Matthew Scott’s guilt wasn’t just because she disliked him.
“You saw what I dug up on him. And I went deep.” Hal shrugged. “There’s just not much there. He’s a Boy Scout.”
They all sat at the kitchen island, taking a water break after an earlier jog.
Jane had needed the run to clear her mind, and Joe refused to let her go by herself, even at home on the ranch.
But when she’d asked Hal for help with her overprotective guard, he’d told her that he would have done the same if he didn’t dislike running so much.
“I know you went deep. I just don’t like the guy. I think I want him to be guilty.” She laid her head down on the table, frustrated.
“Look, you’ve gone as far as you can go on both cases you’re working, right? Let’s brainstorm,” Hal suggested.
“Or shoot things.”
They both regarded Joe with humor.
“Go shoot something, Joe. I’ll stay here, under guard, and talk to Hal.”
Joe sagged in relief. “Thank God. If I had to listen to you two yammer about more conspiracies without just taking out the problem, I’d lose it.” He left in a huff.
Jane stared after him. “I’m a little worried about this sudden desire to shoot first and ask questions later.”
“Part of the problem might be that he learned his niece is dating an older guy his cousin—”
“Which cousin?”
“Penny.”
“Oh, I like her.”
“Well, Penny hates her daughter’s boyfriend. Joe doesn’t like him much either, but Joe can’t say anything because Shantelle will freak out on him as only a sixteen-year-old can.”
She understood. “I guess I’m the placeholder for all his protective tendencies, huh?”
“Well, you know he considers you family.” Shantelle wasn’t actually Joe’s niece but his first cousin once removed. Joe didn’t care. He kept it simple. If he loved you, labels didn’t much matter.
Hal added, “Just cut him some slack. He cares about you. Plus, I don’t think you’ve ever been in this much danger when we were both here to do something about it.”
“Okay, I’ll admit you have a point there.” She knew she’d do whatever it took to help either of them, though her skills didn’t quite match theirs. Her talents lay in the ability to trap and track, not kill.
“So what are you going to do next?” he asked.
“I need to find Dan Simmons’ killer. I need to figure out why someone wants me out of the way so badly. I wasn’t the only one involved in the Mazzuca case. It was the entire unit. So why target me?”
“How do you know the others haven’t been targeted?”
“Sullivan and Williams never mentioned it. I’m sure they would have.”
“Yeah? Want me to look around?”
She hated to say yes, but she had nowhere else to turn. She swallowed hard. “If you would.”
He beamed. “Be right back.” Hal returned moments later with his souped-up laptop that might very well be able to read minds. The monster hacker had no problems getting around firewalls and national security to find answers. Diego could take lessons from him.
Normally, Jane wouldn’t use him or Joe in a case. But things had gone beyond normal.
She could and had majorly annoyed people in the past but not enough to warrant killing her. Although she should probably ask Gina and Scott about that.
“What’s that scary smile for?” Hal asked as his fingers danced over the keyboard.
“Just thinking about people I know who might want to kill me.”
“So many.”
“Ha ha.”
Hal grinned. After a few moments, he turned the laptop around. “Jenn Sullivan’s emails look pretty tame. Rob Williams’ too. And I’ve been reading the rest of your team’s correspondence. Not much going on, except Sandy seems like she’s having an emotional affair with Josh.”
The pair on her team had been pretty cozy following Thanksgiving. “That tracks.”
“Yeah. Wait. Hold on.” He turned the laptop around and continued typing. “Hmm. Read this.”
She joined him to read a bunch of emails from Scott to the ASAC, Jon Haversham. Scott had no idea what to make about the gun violence aimed at his people. Interesting that he still considered her “his people.”
“Doesn’t look like your butthead is guilty.”
“He’s not my—never mind.” She knew better than to get in a stupid argument with Hal. “What are you typing now?”
She watched as he infiltrated Rapp’s Agency email account.
In it, Rapp kept talking to Gambol about getting more agents on the task force, about updates on the danger they faced, and the fact Phillip Keiser knew more than he should.
He also asked about getting Diego a raise and gave kudos to Gina, who might ask to stay on in Seattle once he left.
Jane suppressed an odd pang at the thought of Rapp leaving.
Although typically, once a case closed, so would the special task force.
Did Gambol plan on making the task force into its own squad?
And why did she care if he did? It wasn’t as if she planned on staying.
She had a job waiting for her at the field office.
Hopefully. Still, this assignment had been entertaining as well as challenging.
“Now this is interesting.” Hal pointed at her email.
“You’re hacking me now?” She blinked as she read aloud, “Wait. When did this come in?”
“Yesterday. You need to keep up.”
She read aloud. “From anonymous: You’ll never stop what’s coming. There’s too much at stake. What does that mean?”
“Probably the same thing it meant when they sent that message to Gambol.” He typed something and showed her Gambol’s screen. “I cheated and looked through his emails the other day. I remember seeing that same message.”
“Nice, Hal. If he finds you going through his emails, you’re in trouble.” She didn’t know much about Lionel Gambol, but she knew enough not to mess with him.
“Oh, trust me. I know.” He started to say something else when Joe rushed back into the house.
“She’s home!”
Jane looked at Hal, who looked back at her and shrugged. She pointed to herself. “I know?”
Then Raine walked through the front door carrying a huge seabag over her shoulder. “Well, well, the gang’s all here.”
“Raine?” Jane hadn’t seen her cousin in nearly two weeks, but she’d assumed Raine had been staying somewhere on the property. “I thought you were here already.”
“I left a few days ago to grab some stuff. I, ah, might be back for good. I’m on terminal leave now.”
Hal blinked. “Terminal? I thought you were taking some time to figure things out, not totally leaving the Marine Corps. Oh boy. Does Chris know?”
Joe swept Raine into a big hug.
As if Hal had summoned him, Jane’s uncle called. She saw the caller ID and winced. “He does now.” Before she could think twice about it, she picked up the call and held it out to Raine. “Raine? I think this is for you.”
Raine managed to crawl out of Joe’s embrace to grab the phone. “Yeah?” She winced at the shout that answered.
Hal and Joe shared a commiserating shrug then vanished from the room like ghosts.
Jane would have done the same, because she could hear her uncle screaming at her cousin through the phone despite it not being on speaker.
“Oh no you don’t.” Raine grabbed Jane’s collar. “You threw me to the wolves.”
“Technically, wolf.”
Raine tucked the phone against her chest to muffle her uncle’s roaring. “You put me in this mess. You’re in it with me.”
“Hey, I was nearly killed the other day. I don’t need this kind of stress in my life.”
Raine tugged the phone back to her ear and released Jane. “You’ll be nearly killed again if you leave me with this psycho.” She put the phone on speaker in time for Jane to hear their uncle loud and clear.
“Psycho? Psycho?” Uncle Chris shouted. Explosions and screaming sounded in the background. “You want a psycho? I’ll give you a psycho!”
Jane settled into what promised to be a royal butt-chewing. But hey, at least it wasn’t at her expense.