Mindhunters 4 - Deadly Intent (2 page)

The slight noise sounded again and she tensed, her hand searching for the scissors she kept on the bedside table. But even as her fingers gripped the handle, her mind identified the sound. It was the gurgle of water in the overflow box for the aquarium. Not Cooper’s asthmatic breathing.

The realization relaxed her, but she didn’t replace the scissors. She kept them clutched in her hand and brought them close to her chest, the feel of the small weapon comforting. Learning her daughter slept with a knife under her pillow had made her mother cry. So Ellie pretended not to need that anymore.

She had become very good at pretending.

So good that her mom and dad had been thrilled with her new interest in kirigami several months ago. She’d heard the psychologist tell them that the act of creating, of folding and cutting paper into pretty shapes, would be very therapeutic for her. So there was never any fuss about the constant paper scraps on the floor. Fresh supplies appeared on her desk without her ever having to request them.

Only she knew that the new hobby was an excuse to keep a sharp pair of scissors with her at all times. And the psychologist was right. That part, at least, was very therapeutic.

The initial flare of panic had ebbed. She listened to the blizzard howl outside the windows and found the noise oddly soothing. Bit by bit, she felt herself relax. Her eyelids drooped.

She had the half-formed thought that she needed to replace the scissors before her mom came in the next morning to check on her. But sleep was sucking her under, and her limbs were unresponsive.

It was then that he pounced.

The weight hit her body, jolting her from exhaustion back to alarm in the span of seconds. She felt the hand clamped over her mouth, the prick of a needle in her arm, and fear lent her strength beyond her years. Rearing up in bed, she flailed wildly, trying to wrest away, trying to strike out. She tasted the stickiness of tape over her lips. Felt a hood being pulled over her head.

There was a brief flare of triumph when the scissors met something solid, and a hiss of pain sounded in her ear. But then her hand was bent back, the weapon dropping from her fingers, and numbness started sliding over her body. She couldn’t move. The hood prevented her from seeing. A strange buzzing filled her head.

As she felt herself lifted and carried away, her only thought was that she was being taken.

Again
.

Chapter 1

The sleek black private jet sat waiting, its motors idling. It looked impatient somehow, looming dark and silent in the shadows, as if it had somehow taken on the personality of the man inside it.

Needles of sleet pricked Macy Reid’s cheeks as she hurried across the tarmac at the Manassas Regional Airport. Adam Raiker, head of Raiker Forensics and her boss, had demanded she be there within the hour. Her home in Vienna, Virginia, was nearly twenty miles from the airport. Since the usual DC traffic was light at four A.M., she’d made it in less than forty-five minutes.

An attendant took her suitcases and stowed them for her as she wiped the frigid moisture from her cheeks and made her way up the steps to the aircraft. Her satisfaction at arriving early dissipated when she recognized the man seated in the roomy black leather seat next to her boss. Kellan Burke. Fellow forensic investigator. And the man she’d been avoiding for months.

Her stomach gave one quick lurch before she ordered it to settle. She gave Raiker a nod. “Adam.” She spared barely a glance for the other man as she chose the free seat next to her boss and buckled in. “Burke.”

“The inimitable duchess Macy.” Kellan gave her a sleepy smile that she knew better than to trust. “Been a while since we’ve been paired on an investigation. Miss me?”

“Like a case of foot rot.”

“A comeback,” he noted admiringly. “You’ve been practicing.”

She could feel a flush heating her cheeks and damned yet again the fair complexion that mirrored her emotions. Almost as much as she damned the man for being right. Experience had taught her that it paid to have a ready repertoire of witty replies if she was to spend any length of time in Burke’s presence. Unfortunately, those replies usually occurred several hours after they were required, leaving her at the crucial moment as tongue-tied and frustrated as an eight-year-old.

It also paid to have her guard up and her hormones on a tight leash.
That
experience was more recent, and the memory much more devastating.

Adam pressed a button on his armrest that would alert the pilot to ready for takeoff. “Any squabbling and you’ll ride in the luggage compartment. Both of you.” He leaned forward to withdraw two file folders from the pocket of his briefcase and handed one to each of them as the jet began its taxi down the runway. Macy seized it, grateful to have something else to focus on.

“Stephen Mulder.” Burke was studying the first sheet inside the folder, his expression thoughtful. “Why is that name familiar?”

“Maybe because he’s the owner of the discount stores that bear his name.” Raiker’s voice was dry. “A quick Google check shows there are two thousand Mulders in the country, with several hundred more operations in Europe, Asia, and South America.”

The name had also struck a chord of recognition with Macy, but not for the same reason. “Stephen Mulder? His daughter was one of the girls rescued when you broke that child swap ring a few years ago.” The case wasn’t one she was likely to forget. Her testimony had helped put one of the perpetrators behind bars. It had also brought her to Raiker’s attention.

“That’s right.” For Burke’s benefit, he explained, “Ellie Mulder was seven when she was snatched while attending a friend’s birthday party. FBI took control of the investigation almost immediately. She was found incidentally when one of my cases overlapped a couple years later. I broke up a child auction, and her kidnapper was among those looking for a trade-in. By that point, she’d been missing twenty-two months.”

Macy’s gaze dropped to the opened folder in her lap. A moment later she froze in the act of scanning the information he’d put together for them. “She’s been abducted . . . again?”

“Sometime between eleven and two A.M. this morning.” Raiker’s expression was grim. “The entire Denver area was having a hellacious blizzard, and Ellie’s mother went in to check on her. She discovered her missing from her bed and looked around the house. Woke her husband when she didn’t find her, and they searched the estate. He called me an hour after they discovered her gone.”

“But not the FBI,” Burke guessed shrewdly.

Macy caught Raiker’s gaze on her and followed it to where her fingers lay against the folder. Her fingers were beating a familiar tattoo against the surface.
Tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap.
Throat drying, she deliberately stilled them and refocused her thoughts.

“The feds failed her before.” She met Raiker’s stare, knew she was right. “They had nearly two years to find her the first time. But you’re the one responsible for bringing her home to them. So her father contacted you.”

Her employer inclined his head. “If the Mulders had their way, no law enforcement would be involved at all. They’re pretty devoid of respect for LEOs after the last incident. But I convinced Stephen that he has no choice but to report Ellie’s disappearance. He has a personal relationship with the governor and both Colorado U.S. senators. He’ll use his influence to bring in the Colorado Bureau of Investigation as leads.”

“Elbowing aside the Denver PD,” Kellan muttered, still studying the contents of the file.

“The Mulder estate is located near Conifer. It actually falls under the jurisdiction of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office. Mulder is still bitter at the way the feds kept him out of the loop on the first kidnapping. He’s insisting we stay on his estate so he can be updated as often as possible. CBI isn’t going to like that. Without proper management, this could turn into a territorial tug-of-war of monumental proportions.”

Macy considered the ramifications. Being hired by a family member rather than the investigating law enforcement entity made their appearance on the scene a bit more tenuous. In a case like this, suspicion fell first on the family and those in closest proximity to the child. The CBI would worry that their allegiance to Mulder would take precedence over their commitment to teamwork. Without Raiker running interference, they could be shut out of the investigative end of things almost completely. He was going to have his plate full handling the politics of this one.

She glanced at Burke. Found him watching her through a pair of trendy dark-framed glasses that were new since the last time she’d seen him. “They’re going to want to bring in their own people.”

“Of course. But it’s my job to convince them they don’t have anyone who can match the experience the two of you bring. Don’t make a liar out of me.”

It took her a moment to realize Raiker was joking. It was always difficult to tell with him. “You’ve checked on Cooper’s whereabouts?”

“Art Cooper is still in prison in Sussex, fulfilling his thirty-year sentence for the kidnap and rape of Ellie Mulder.”

“And . . . the others?” It took all her resolve not to fidget under the shrewd look Raiker aimed her way.

“All accounted for, still inside serving their time.”

She wouldn’t have asked. Couldn’t have formed the words. But in the next moment, he added deliberately, “Castillo has been bounced around some. He’s currently housed at Terre Haute in Indiana.”

“So are we looking at the original group you rounded up in that first case?” Burke demanded. “Do any of them have the cajones to reach out this way from prison?”

“Every avenue will need to be explored.” Adam outstretched his injured leg, nudging aside the cane he was never without. “We can’t afford to overlook the possibility that Ellie’s disappearance this time is somehow connected to that first kidnapping. I’ll line up the interviews for each with the prison wardens and make personal visits.”

There was a sick knot of dread settling in the pit of Macy’s stomach. With an ease born of long practice, she pushed it aside and looked at her boss. “And then we have to decide who the real target of this crime is. Ellie Mulder, or her father.”

There were more than a dozen SUVs and vans parked in the wide drive that looped in a half circle in front of the sprawling Mulder estate. Additionally, what looked like a black oversized ambulance set on a sixteen wheeler was pulled up next to the house. It didn’t look like Stephen Mulder had been successful in limiting the scope of the LEO presence. The still-heavy snowfall had already buried the vehicles and had slicked the roads here from the airport. A drop in temperature would make them treacherous.

Macy stepped out of the SUV and scanned the grounds. They’d been detained at the iron gates at the base of the drive, more than a quarter mile back, until the CBI agent posted there had scrutinized their IDs and waited for permission from someone inside to admit them. That had given her plenty of time to eye the twelve-foot stone walls that surrounded the property. Discreetly placed security cameras topped them at regular intervals. The security station in front of the gates was meant to be manned by a live operator. If a stranger had gotten in and out of the estate undetected, he wasn’t an amateur.

The front door of the home swung open as they got out of the SUV. From the grim-faced visage of the man in the doorway, Macy knew immediately he was another CBI agent.

He waited until they’d ascended the stairs to demand their IDs again. It occurred to her that the extra precautions were a bit late. Ellie Mulder was
gone
.

“Assistant Director Cal Whitman is waiting for you in the study with Mr. Mulder. This way.”

They were led through a marbled-floor hallway that was lined with paintings and punctuated by large abstract sculptures. Macy recognized some of the artists, had no doubt the pieces were original. With Mulder’s billions, there was little he couldn’t afford. Except the one thing his money apparently couldn’t buy.

His daughter’s safety.

“Not too shabby,” Kellan said in an undertone as he strolled along at her side, casting an appraising look at the place. “What do you figure? Fifteen million? Twenty?”

“I wouldn’t know.” It was usually best to ignore Burke. But the man made it difficult. Even now she could feel his pale green eyes on her, alight, no doubt, with amusement. It seemed to be the primary emotion she elicited from him.

The hallway seemed endless. They trailed Raiker and the CBI agent who had let them in. “Pretty easy to get lost in a place this huge,” Burke said, unzipping his navy down jacket and shoving his hands in its pockets. “How long do you think it would take them to locate us?”

“Why don’t you find out?”

He gave her a lazy grin. The prism of lights from the crystals on the overhead chandeliers shot his thick brown hair with reddish glints. She’d bet money he’d been auburn-haired as a youngster. And probably incorrigible even then.

“If you promise to lead the search and rescue party, I might consider it. I can imagine it now. Me, weak from lack of food, maybe injured. You, bending over me in concern, wiping my brow, the strap of your lacy camisole slipping down one satiny shoulder . . .”