As Good as Dead (29 page)

“It’s a little late for regrets,” Ethan said. “And yes, you should have gone. If you hadn’t, I wouldn’t have found you or your family.”

Luke tried to sit up again. “You know about Kinsey and Marie? Are they okay?”

“They’re fine as far as I know.”

The hit man was standing now, moving toward them, the gun in his hand. “Now that you’ve had your little reunion, do you mind if we get started?”

The professor gestured for Angel to sit down in the easy chair close to Luke, which she did.

“Luke, please tell me what’s going on,” Angel said again.

“I’m not sure,” Luke told her. “All I know is that I met this man at the golf course. The next thing I know, I’m out here in the cabin.”

“If what the professor told me is true, he’s the hit man who killed the witness and guard and led everyone to believe you did it.”

“I’ve come to that conclusion myself,” Luke told her.

“I gave Luke his freedom,” the big man said. “And told him to change his identity.”

“You also made sure he’d be suspect in the murders.” Angel glared at him. “Why are we here? Are you going to kill us both? Just because Luke came out of hiding to go to our father’s funeral?” Angel leaned forward, elbows on her knees.

The hit man glanced at the professor, then back at Angel. “I’m not planning to kill either one of you. Luke’s actions helped me track him down. Unfortunately, they have helped others to find him as well.”

The professor cleared his throat. “Angel, I’d like you to meet my brother, Cade.”

“Your... your brother?” Now that he’d said it, Angel could see the likeness. Both men had the same husky build. The same broad shoulders and similarly shaped eyes. Both had graying hair, though the professor’s was more silver. “What do you want from us?”

Professor Hathaway took the empty chair near his brother, so that all of them were seated in a semicircle around the fireplace. “I know you’re anxious to know why we’ve brought you both here, and I’ll get to the point. Cade and I need a favor.” He sighed and glanced at Cade. “Or rather, my brother does. Cade is going to give you a statement, and you two will witness and sign it. You, Angel, will then take it to the police.”

“Statement?” Her gaze shifted back to Cade. “As in, you’re going to confess to the murders and tell us who hired you?”

Cade nodded. “I’m going to give you as much information as I can. Then it will be up to you and your detective friend to put the rest of the pieces together.” His shoulders rose and fell in a heavy breath. “I’m a professional hit man. And I’m very good at what I do. At least I used to be.”

“Killing people?” Angel’s tone held far less contempt than she felt. “How can you see anything good in that?”

“I’m selective.”

“Oh, right, you have your standards.”

“Yes, I do.” The man seemed subdued and maybe contrite. “Which is one of the reasons your brother is still alive.” He paused and shifted his gaze to Luke. “I knew about your connections to the church—your brother is a pastor. At any rate, someone who wanted John Stanton killed prior to the trial contacted me. You and the guard were on that hit list.”

“And that someone is...?” Angel asked.

“He doesn’t know.” The professor went into the kitchen to fill his coffee cup and Cade’s from the pot on the stove. He lifted the pot in her direction. “Would you like some?”

“No thanks.”

“How could you not know?” Angel asked after the professor sat back down.

“I use code names,” Cade said. “No one knows me by name, and I don’t know them. There are several contacts a client goes through before coming to me. I prefer anonymity on both sides. My system has always worked.”

“Until now.” The professor sighed, seeming almost resigned to what his brother did for a living.

“You have no idea who actually hired you?” Luke asked.

Cade took a drink of the coffee his brother had just poured for him. “At first I thought I’d been hired by the Penghetti brothers. Then, after a while, I began to wonder. It seemed to me that one witness wouldn’t make or break the weak case the DA had against them. I tried to backtrack through my chain of contacts and couldn’t get to the original source. I even tracked down the witness’s family—not as myself, of course. I discovered that Stanton had married into the Penghetti family. Before going to the DA, he’d been fired for his drug operation. The Penghettis weren’t too happy about that, but I couldn’t find a link to anyone in the family who might have hired me.”

“I still don’t understand,” Angel said. “How could you not know who hired you?”

“Whoever contacted me used an alias, and the trail had gone cold. I went to see the man I used as my first contact. He was dead. So were the second contact and the third. That’s not coincidence. Whoever hired me is trying to track me down. Maybe he knows who I am already, maybe not. He must have somehow discovered that I hadn’t killed Luke. Which means he’s probably after both of us.”

“Why are you telling us this now?” Angel asked. “You say your identity is well protected, so...”

“When I read that Luke’s father had died, I got worried that Luke would make contact and that the guy who hired me would realize that Luke wasn’t dead. Since no body was ever found, there was no way to prove his actual death. I thought my contact believed me when I told him I’d used Luke as a scapegoat and that he and the gun were in a swamp in Alligator Alley, but apparently not.”

“So everything busted loose when my father died?” Luke said.

“Before that, actually,” Professor Hathaway said. “Angel’s officer-involved shooting was televised nationwide. Cade thought you, Luke, might try to contact your family. That’s when he went to Sunset Cove to keep an eye on them. We don’t know why Luke was named in the assassination plot to kill Stanton, but I believe Luke knows something that could incriminate whoever hired Cade.”

Luke winced in pain as he shifted positions. “I don’t know what that would be. The only contact I had with the witness was through the DA. He’d gotten the statement from Stanton, implicating the Penghetti brothers in half a dozen crimes.”

“Bernard Penghetti told me they hadn’t ordered a hit,” Angel told them. “He wants to clear the family name and says he thinks the DA hired the hit himself.”

The professor’s gaze shifted from one to the other. “I’ve considered that possibility myself but can’t see it. Alton Delong was a bit of a rogue. I can almost see him manufacturing a witness to put the Penghetti brothers away once and for all. But to hire a hit on his witness?”

“What if the witness wanted more money or decided to tell the truth?” Angel asked.

“Alton wouldn’t have done that,” Luke insisted. “Besides, why include me? He had nothing to gain from my death—or Stanton’s. It makes no sense.”

“All I know is that I want to confess my part and move on,” Cade said.

“Why the change of heart?” Angel asked.

“I’m old and tired and I’ve been diagnosed with cancer. I want a clean slate when I die.”

“A clean slate.” Angel shook her head. “How many people have you killed?”

“It doesn’t matter. I’ve been thinking a lot about religion lately. My father was a priest, and I remember hearing him talk about the two men who hung on either side of Christ when he was strung up on the cross. Jesus forgave the murderer. I guess I’m ready to bank on that.”

“Let me get this straight. You’re giving yourself up to the police and you’re not out to kill Luke? Why didn’t you just turn yourself in instead of bringing Luke and me out here?”

“Believe it or not, I’m concerned that the man who hired me is determined to kill Luke. Ethan and I thought it best to pull him out of harm’s way. We know about the man who tried to kill your friend Nick. If you find the person who hired him, you’ll have your killer.”

“Justin Moore was killed before he could identify anyone.” Angel leaned back, relieved and at the same time wary. How much trust could she put into a man who killed people for a living?

“What now?” Luke asked. “Can’t you just let us go? My leg’s broken, and like Angel said, I need medical care.”

The professor nodded. “In light of what’s happened to Luke, I suggest we alter the plan a bit. I’d like to take Luke to the hospital before I fetch Detective Riley. I’m sure we’ll have no problem getting the police to set up twenty-four-hour security on him, so he should be quite safe.”

“You’re going to make me stay out here with your brother?” Angel shuddered at the thought. “Why can’t we all go?”

Cade folded his arms. “We’ll need some insurance that your friend Callen will cooperate with us.”

Angel still didn’t understand his motives. “You brought Luke out here to protect him, but I still don’t see why you brought me. If you want Callen, why not just have him come out?”

“With Luke here, we felt certain you’d come. Callen isn’t invested in your brother. He is invested in you, however, and I have a hunch he’ll do as we ask.”

Angel doubted this but didn’t say so. Callen would go with Ethan, but he wouldn’t come alone. Even though Cade seemed sincere in his admission of guilt, she didn’t trust him. Yet, as much as Angel hated the idea of keeping Cade company, she encouraged Dr. Hathaway and Cade to transfer Luke to the car so he could get medical help as soon as possible. The sooner Ethan could get Luke to the hospital, the sooner he’d contact Callen and get him out here. She’d feel a hundred times better if she could even the odds.

When they could no longer see the red Camry, Cade ambled back to the cabin. He stopped before going inside and looked back at Angel. “They’ll be a while. Want to do a little fishing?”

FORTY-SIX

N
ever—not even in her wildest imagination—did Angel think she’d be sitting in a boat in the middle of a cool, clear Idaho lake, watching the wildlife and catching fish with a murderer. Yet being here with Cade seemed oddly peaceful.

A doe and a buck came down to the water to drink and didn’t seem to mind sharing with the humans. Water lapped gently against the boat while Angel put another worm on the hook and dropped in her line. “My father would’ve loved it here.”

“Mine as well.”

Angel hesitated before asking her question. “How did you and Ethan take such different paths in life?”

“You mean how did we end up on opposite sides of the law? My father was murdered when I was just ten and Ethan twelve. Our mother died soon after, and we were placed in the system and adopted out to different families. Ethan handled things differently than me. He took the losses in stride and became attached to his adopted parents. I became angry and rebelled. Ethan went to law school, graduated with honors. I graduated with a business degree and became a stockbroker who dabbled in... other things.”

“Killing people.” As strange as it seemed, Angel found Cade easy to talk to, and that bothered her.

“On occasion.” He lifted his pole and set it down again. “Most of the time, the killings were made to look like accidents. At first I fancied myself a vigilante of sorts. I suppose psychiatrists would say I was avenging my father’s death. Most of my victims, if you could call them that, were bad guys who had beaten the system. I’m quite certain some of my clients were actually police officers who wanted to see justice done.”

“Did they know who you were?”

“No. There were always safeguards. I became an expert in disguises and had a number of aliases.”

“And Ethan knew about this?”

He shook his head. “We lost touch for a while, and by the time I found him again, I was efficiently leading a double life.”

“Do you have other family?” Angel took a sip of diet cola she’d brought along.

“I never married. Relationships make you too vulnerable, and I had to be ready to move on at a moment’s notice.”

“What made you decide to give it up?”

“Age. Conscience. I felt justified in what I was doing, and now... let’s just say my worldview has changed considerably—partly because of your brother.”

“Luke?”

“Tim. I followed you when you went to church and heard his sermon on salvation.”

“You really don’t know who hired you to kill Luke?”

“My client had safeguards, and I couldn’t trace him.”

The sound of tires crunching on gravel and the purring of a car’s engine penetrated the silence, and Angel glanced back toward the cabin. Cade heard it as well. “Looks like we have company,” he said.

“It’s too soon for Ethan to be back.”

Angel spotted the black limousine through the trees as it turned into the driveway. Two men emerged from the car. Dan and Bernie. “That’s Bernie Penghetti and his bodyguard.”

Cade reeled in his line and set the pole in the boat, then picked up the oars. “We’d better head for cover. I don’t know how they managed to find us, but I doubt they’re out for a joyride.”

Angel reeled in her line as well. The men had disappeared from sight, no doubt checking out the cabin. When they realized it was empty, would they think to look out on the lake?

Cade’s powerful strokes pulled them off to the side, and within seconds they were hidden from Bernie and Dan’s view.

“What are we going to do?” Angel’s mind raced with possibilities. “Ethan and Callen will be here soon.”

“How could they have known about the cabin?” Cade frowned and settled the oars in the boat as they touched the shoreline.

Angel frowned. “I’ll bet Bernie planted some kind of tracking device or a GPS in my purse or in my pocket. I didn’t even think to check.” She groaned. “How could I be such an idiot?” The purse was in the cabin along with Cade’s gun. Would Bernie and Dan wait for someone to show up? Or would they leave when they found the cabin empty?

“Perhaps we can get to the road and warn Ethan before he gets to the cabin.” Cade peered into the woods.

“Good idea.” They’d rowed to the west of the cabin. The forest and brush would be hard to navigate. “How far is the road from here?”

“Probably half a mile, no more. If we go straight ahead, we should come to it.”

“All right, then, let’s go.” Angel began jogging, and Cade followed, but within a few feet he faded back. “Can’t run,” he gasped. “Pain in my chest. Go ahead. I’ll wait for you by the boat.”