Dead Wrong Read online

  He tried his best not to limp.

  “I’m going to close up the house,” she announced as she locked the front door. “You can go on up to your room, or stay down here and watch TV. Whichever you prefer.”

  “I’ll check the back.” He started toward the back of the house.

  “I said I’d do it. I’m really not helpless.” She made an effort to soften her tone just a bit. After all, he was doing her a favor by being here.

  Correction. He was doing Annie a favor.

  He barely glanced at her as he went down the hall to the back of the house where French doors opened onto the deck. He pulled against them, then, on his way back, pulled the slide lock shut on the basement door.

  “You could use a dead bolt on those doors back there,” he told her. “Did you check the kitchen windows?”

  “Yes, thanks.”

  “Then I’ll see you in the morning.” He turned from her and began to climb the stairs, clearly favoring one leg, leaning heavily on the rail for support, and it was then that she realized just what his determination to keep up with her pace had cost him.

  She tried to reconcile the man slowly laboring to climb the steps with all that Annie had told her over the years about the man Mara had first met at Annie and Dylan’s engagement party, a meeting that Aidan apparently did not recall. She knew from Annie that both he and Dylan—along with their older brother, Connor—played at some of the Bureau’s most dangerous games. The Shields brothers had moved with a sleek air of danger, of intrigue, that had fascinated and drawn the attention of all the ladies, including Mara.

  That quickness, that sureness, was nowhere to be found in the man who, seconds earlier, had limped toward the stairwell without complaint, and she understood now why she hadn’t immediately recognized him earlier in the driveway. The Aidan Shields on the steps was softer and twenty or so pounds heavier than the Aidan Shields who had gone undercover with his brother that one last time. The Aidan Shields who had carried his brother from an alley on a shattered leg, a bullet lodged in his hip. . . .

  The brisk-paced walk around the block had clearly been too much for him. She’d been a total ass not to realize how hard-pressed he’d been to keep up. A peace offering was in order. She threw out the only thing she had that could equate his sacrifice.

  “My husband and I divorced seven years ago,” she said quietly. “The day after the divorce became final, he took our daughter and disappeared.”

  He stopped midway up the steps and turned to look down at her. This time she did not look away.

  “You mean he—?”

  “Yes.” She didn’t wait for him to finish. “He took her and vanished and I haven’t seen either of them since.”

  “I’m assuming that Annie . . .” He gestured helplessly with one hand, stunned by her admission.

  “Yes, of course, Annie pulled out all the stops. But he’s very, very smart. He’s changed his name, and he’s done everything that people do when they want to make certain that no one ever finds them.”

  “Why would he . . . How could he—?” He spoke his thoughts aloud, understanding now why she’d been so upset by his innocent inquiry about her daughter, his mistaken entry into her room.

  “He wanted to punish me”—Mara did not bother to force back her tears—“for not wanting to be married to him anymore. He knew that the only way he could really hurt me was to take her from me. And that’s what he did.”

  “How old was she?” He lowered himself to a step and sat.

  “Five. Her name is Julianne.” Tears streamed down her face. She hadn’t spoken aloud of her daughter to anyone except Annie in several years. She hadn’t realized just how hard it would be. “At least, it was Julianne. I’ve often wondered if he made her change her name, too.”

  “I’m sorry. I had no way of knowing. Annie never told me—”

  “I know. It’s all right.” She crossed her arms over her chest and tried to squeeze away the pain.

  “You’ve looked for her . . . ?”

  “For the first year, I did nothing else. Annie had the FBI in overdrive looking for them. Then, for almost two years, I had private detectives trying to track them down. But one thing I learned—if someone really wants to disappear, there are a million ways to do it. Once we got close, but Jules somehow knew or sensed that he was being watched, and they disappeared again. That was early on, maybe eight months or so after he left. We haven’t had a good lead since then. He’s kept a really low profile.” She exhaled deeply. “Every couple of months, Annie runs a trace. I’m still looking for Julianne, of course. I won’t stop until I find her. I’ll never stop.”

  “If there’s anything I can do . . .” He paused, thinking how stupid he sounded. He was out of shape, out of luck, out of the loop. What did he really think he could do, when all of Annie’s resources—the entire FBI network—had come up empty?

  “I appreciate that. Thanks.” She nodded and backed away. “Well, I’m going to finish closing up. Thanks again.”

  Mara went into the kitchen. He heard her shut a cabinet door, heard the faucet turn on, then off. A minute later, one by one, the downstairs lights went off, and Aidan turned back to the task of climbing the steps.

  Just as the clock from a nearby church tower struck two, Aidan sat straight up in the bed, prodded by dark dreams. It was not unusual for his sleep to be interrupted by nightmares. The demons had been tormenting him relentlessly for months. But tonight the old demons wore new faces. Some hunted down unsuspecting women and ravaged their bodies; some stole their children and broke their hearts. And he, Aidan Shields, was helpless, trapped in a body that betrayed him at every turn.

  He lay awake until dawn, trying to make up excuses for his present condition while at the same time wondering how he’d let himself sink this low.

  He’d been painfully winded just from walking around the block. Sad but true.

  Okay, sure, it had been a big block, but he’d all but killed himself trying to keep up with a short woman and a little dog whose legs weren’t more than eight inches long. He, who had once undergone special ops training—who had run for miles in the hot sun with a forty-pound pack on his back; who had, for six years after college, survived weeks in the desert, in the jungle, in the Arctic—couldn’t walk a distance of four blocks. Hell, he’d been wheezing by the time they’d hit the corner at the end of Mara’s street.

  It was the little dog that really got to him the most. Spike hadn’t even been breathing hard when they’d rounded the last bend for home. Pathetic.

  Bested by a Jack Russell terrier. And an old one, at that.

  Disgusted with himself, he shifted his weight from his throbbing bad hip.

  Not much he could do about the pain, he acknowledged. And the limp . . . well, there wasn’t much he could do about that, either.

  It had been a hard reality to face. He’d quit physical therapy because he knew that even with the best of programs, he’d never be the same. He’d never be nearly as good. No matter what he put himself through, he’d never be able to run again without pain. He’d never work undercover, he’d never be trusted to watch someone’s back. Babysitting Annie’s little sister didn’t count.

  And on top of it all, he was out of shape in every conceivable way. Admitting that it humiliated him when he was unable to ignore the contrast between the man he was today and the man he’d once been.

  He’d never be that man again. It was a hard truth to accept.

  He flexed his right hand, unable to hold a gun since that terrible night, then flexed his left. He’d been trained to shoot with his nondominant hand. Surely if he worked at it, he could regain that proficiency again. . . .

  The lights from a plane moved across the night sky, and he watched it for several long minutes before lying back down and closing his eyes, thinking about how hard it must be for Mara to stay in this house, to walk past that empty bedroom every day.

  He recognized that, as terrible as his own tragedy had been, he, at l
east, had closure. Mara had none. She had faced every new day for seven years with the same unanswered questions, the same void, the same pain. And she was handling her situation with infinitely more grace, more courage, than he was handling his. At least she kept going. He had given up.

  He lay in the dark feeling pissed off at fate and life until the sun came up and spilled across the foot of the bed. Mostly, he was pissed off at himself.

  When he heard the shower in the bathroom on the other side of the wall, he swung his legs over the side of the bed. Mara was up, and if he was to fulfill his promise to Annie, he needed to be up as well.

  If he could do nothing else, he could at least show up.

  * * *

  “Could you just stay behind me so that it doesn’t look like you’re following me?” Mara stood next to her car, the driver’s door open, keys in her hand.

  “Maybe you could give me some tips on that, since I’ve never tailed a vehicle before.” He placed his hands on his hips and stared at her. What did she think the FBI trained people to do?

  Before she could respond, he went on. “Just make sure that you call me if you leave the office.”

  “I may have three or four appointments today. You can’t spend the day running back and forth.” She slid behind the wheel of the Jetta.

  “Watch me.” He got into the Vette, adding, “See you at lunch,” as he slammed the car door.

  She leaned out the window to call back to him, “What do you mean, see you at lunch?”

  “I mean I’ll pick you up and we’ll—”

  “No, we will not.” She got out of her car and walked back to his. “Aidan, I don’t want people in my office to think that that I’m . . . that I’m . . .”

  “Dating a guy with a gimp leg?”

  “Get over yourself, Aidan. That was a stupid thing to say and I’m going to ignore it.” Her eyes narrowed. “I’ve never brought my personal business into the courthouse. I don’t want to do that now.”

  “Well, right now we all have to do things we don’t want to do.”

  “Look, if you don’t want to be here, I don’t want you to stay. God knows I don’t want to hold you against your will.”

  “I promised your sister I’d keep you safe and alive, and that’s what I’m going to do.”

  They stared each other down for a long minute.

  “Okay.” He was the first to break. “How ’bout if we compromise and I bring you lunch?”

  “How ’bout if I ask someone in my office to pick up something for me when they go out?”

  “As long as you’re not out of that building by yourself. You have the number for my cell phone. Don’t be shy about using it if for any reason you feel uncomfortable or uneasy about anything or anyone. Do not underestimate this guy.”

  “Do you really think he’s going to come after me in the courthouse?”

  “I have no idea what he’s going to do. I just want to make sure I’m around when he makes his move.”

  “If he makes his move,” she muttered as she slid behind the wheel of the Jetta.

  “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

  “ ‘Just don’t do anything stupid,’ ” she muttered as she started her car. “Like I really want this guy to find me . . .”

  Aidan backed out of the drive, then waited for her to pull out so that he could follow her. It was a twelve-minute ride to the courthouse, and he parked illegally while she parked in the employees’ garage. It was early, early enough for her to have found a place near the gate and the Plexiglas enclosure where the attendant sat. Aidan watched her exit the garage, watched her walk across the street and along the walkway, watching all the while to see if someone else was watching her as well.

  After Mara disappeared into the courthouse, he sat for another minute or so, observing the comings and goings, until a police car pulled next to him and the officer pointed to the NO PARKING sign. Aidan nodded to the officer, waved, and moved on.

  Back at Mara’s, he parked near the garage and, using the key that Mara had given him, entered the back of the house through the French doors. Spike was there to greet him.

  “You don’t need to go out,” Aidan said aloud. “Mara took you for a walk this morning.”

  Spike continued to wag his tail hopefully.

  “All right, I’ll tell you what. I’m going to change, and then we’ll go out for a while. But you have to slow the pace down a little, understand? I’m a little out of shape right now. . . .”

  Ten minutes later, a house key in one pocket of his zip-front sweatshirt, his cell phone in the other, Aidan started out with Spike.

  “Slow down, would you?” He tugged lightly on Spike’s leash. Miraculously, Spike responded and was immediately rewarded by finding what was apparently a noteworthy smell on a patch of grass two houses down from Mara’s.

  “There, see what you miss when you buzz along at that breakneck pace? This is what humans mean when they say take time to stop and smell the flowers. In your case, those would be dandelions. That other thing you were sniffing there, I don’t need to know what that was.”

  They walked the same four-block square that Mara had followed the night before. Aidan was mildly winded by the time they returned to the house, but encouraged all the same. By slowing his pace, he had made it all the way without feeling like he needed to stop to nurse along his leg, a small victory of sorts.

  He sat out on the deck steps and tried to make an honest assessment of his situation. All the exercise in the world wouldn’t bring back the Aidan Shields he’d been just a short year ago. Nothing would.

  But getting out of breath just walking around the block . . . well, he could do something about that.

  Pathetic. He shook his head. Just plain pathetic . . .

  The admission did little to lighten his mood. Not that he’d started out the day on a particularly chipper note. He’d slept poorly and woke in a piss-poor frame of mind. It had been all he could do not to snap at Mara. The instant coffee—instant swill had been more like it—hadn’t done much for his mood. Who made instant coffee these days? He wondered if it might not be worth it to buy a coffeemaker. Would he offend Mara? Nah. Anyone who drank coffee that bad on a regular basis had to have a tougher skin than that.

  He watched a wren stuff a long piece of grass through the opening of a birdhouse that hung from a low tree branch and contemplated his situation.

  He couldn’t even glorify what he was doing by calling it bodyguarding.

  My—he shook his head—how the mighty have fallen.

  He called Spike and coaxed him back inside, locking the back door before moving on to the living room.

  There’s a book in there someplace, he told himself ruefully. “How I Went from Feared FBI Agent to Babysitter in One Short Year.” Subtitle: “Bad Coffee and Bad Gigs.”

  Still, a promise was a promise. And she was Annie’s sister. He’d had to keep reminding himself of the fact. Like when she’d gotten out of her car and stalked back down the driveway to the Vette to let him know in no uncertain terms that he was not coming to her office to pick her up for lunch. She’d had fire in her eyes and a purpose to her stride.

  Actually, she’d looked pretty damned good.

  “Forget it,” he muttered aloud. “Don’t even think about going there . . .”

  Spike picked his head up at the sound of Aidan’s voice.

  “You don’t want to know,” Aidan told him. “And no, we’re not going out again now. We just came in.”

  Spike sank back down with a disappointed sigh.

  Mara had made it clear that she didn’t want him there, didn’t want to share her space with him. She’d only agreed to his staying when Annie told her about the serial killer.

  Which gave Aidan an idea of just how desirable he was these days. Given the choice between his company and possibly facing a serial killer alone, Mara had reluctantly agreed to let him stay.

  That pretty much said it all, didn’t it? And just how much protection he’d
be against a serial killer was up in the air right about then.

  He wished he could go back to his little apartment where he could feel sorry for himself in peace.

  Wished he could go to sleep and wake up the man he used to be.

  He stretched out on the sofa, his arms folded behind his head. He usually napped around now anyway. It was something to do.

  He closed his eyes, wondering just how long it would be before they got a bead on the killer. Tonight couldn’t be soon enough. With luck, they’d find him before he found another victim. And then Aidan could go back to his apartment, where he could be miserable all by himself and not think about the fact that he couldn’t walk around the block without wanting to pass out, where he could start off the day with good coffee, if nothing else. Eventually, he was certain, that day would come.

  It was all he had to look forward to.

  CHAPTER

  SIX

  AS PROMISED, MARA CALLED AIDAN TWENTY MINUTES before she was ready to leave the office at the end of the day. The Corvette was there, waiting to follow her home, when she emerged from the parking garage.

  “I took your mail in,” Aidan told her after they’d arrived at the house and she reached to open the mailbox. “It’s on the kitchen counter.”

  “Oh. Well. Thanks.” She nodded and unlocked the door. “I’ll just take a quick look at it before I take Spike for his walk.”

  “He’s been in and out all day.”

  “Oh. Well, then.” She went to the phone and pressed the button for messages, but there were none.

  “You had two calls.” He handed her a slip of paper upon which he’d listed the names and numbers of the callers.

  “You answered my phone?” She raised an eyebrow, mildly annoyed at this invasion of privacy.

  “If someone is watching you, he might call to see if anyone picks up the phone. To see if you live alone.”