Special Agent's Perfect Cover Read online

  His voice was patronizing as he said, “That’s my girl.”

  Hawk stole a covert glance at Carly. That was the kind of remark that would have had her seeing red in the old days. Seeing red and putting someone like Grayson in his place.

  But she looked perfectly serene now, as if the man’s smarmy remark made absolutely no impression whatsoever.

  She really was one hell of an actress, Hawk thought again, silently tipping his hat to her. This was a side of Carly that he’d never seen before, hadn’t even suspected existed. All he knew was that there was a time when she would have instantly made her feelings about Grayson’s crass assumption known.

  Hell, she might have even contemplated gutting the man—or making him think that she would.

  Hawk suppressed an amused smile. The next moment, he saw that Grayson’s eyes had shifted in his direction. Hawk was instantly on his guard.

  Walking over to him, hands outstretched as if he were greeting a long-lost brother, Grayson asked in a booming voice, “Am I in the presence of a new convert?” he asked.

  Rather than tender a negative answer to the question, Hawk identified himself instead. Taking out his wallet, he opened it to display his ID and held it up for Grayson’s perusal.

  “I’m special agent Hawk Bledsoe with—”

  “The FBI,” Grayson concluded with a nod of his head, which seemed more of a dismissal. “Yes, I am well aware what makes you so special, Agent Bledsoe,” Grayson replied in a humoring tone that Hawk found exceedingly grating. “To what do I owe this pleasure?” he asked, his tone neutral, giving nothing away.

  How much did the man actually know, and how much was he bluffing? Hawk caught himself wondering.

  Out loud, he announced, “I have a few questions for you, Mr. Grayson.”

  Though Grayson continued to maintain his welcoming smile, there was a complacency to it that existed just along the perimeter. He thought himself superior, Hawk realized. That was fine with him. As long as the man thought he had the upper hand, he wouldn’t be that aware that he was being taken down.

  “Everyone does,” he told Hawk easily. “I’ll do my best to answer them for you. In just one moment,” he said, holding up his finger to indicated that he wanted his “guest” to pause his thoughts. “Carly, I’m going to need to see your lesson plan for tomorrow’s children seminar,” he told her. “If you don’t mind, I’d like you to drop it off in my office later this evening. Say around nine?” he suggested, eyeing her. Waiting for her compliance.

  “Of course, Samuel. Nine will be fine,” she replied in the same obedient, subservient tone that her sister had.

  Turning back to Hawk, Grayson clasped his hands together before him and said, “Now then, you said you have some questions for me?”

  He had questions all right. Foremost was why did Grayson want to see Carly in his office later this evening? Was he just asking her to drop off the papers, or did he have something else in mind for her?

  Though he gave no outward indication, Hawk could feel anger flare within him. It took a great deal to keep it under control.

  Forcing himself to focus on the present, Hawk opened up the manila envelope he had brought with him. As Grayson watched with what he took to be feigned interest, he removed five eight-by-ten photographs, one for each of the women who had been found.

  “We’re investigating the deaths of these five women,” he told Grayson, deliberately substituting the word deaths for murders. One by one, he shuffled through them, displaying each for Grayson’s benefit. He watched the man’s face intently. “Do you recognize any of them?” he asked.

  Grayson dutifully viewed one photograph after another. His expression never changed, and he gave no indication that he recognized any of the women.

  Even so, Hawk could have sworn that the small, blue vein at the man’s right temple pulsed as he looked down at the photographs. There was genuine surprise registered there, he thought. Apparently Grayson hadn’t thought that these bodies would ever surface.

  But he knew them. Hawk would bet his soul on that. Grayson knew each of these women, including their mysterious Jane Doe. Getting him to admit it, though, would be difficult if not impossible.

  He needed someone on the inside to bear witness against the man.

  Shaking his head, Grayson returned the photographs. “I’m afraid I really can’t be of any help to you. I don’t recall meeting any of these unfortunate ladies. The faces from my past tend to run together.”

  I just bet they do, Hawk thought, taking the photographs back and slipping them into the envelope again.

  “I have seen so many people—I started out as a motivational speaker, you know,” Grayson explained in an aside. “That was before I found my true calling.” His hands swept about, indicating the now-empty auditorium.

  Hawk continued to watch the man’s face, looking for a breech, some telltale sign, however small, to give him a clue to his real intent in taking over Cold Plains. “And that would be?”

  “Why, leaving my mark on this wonderful town, of course. Making sure that it is developed to meet its full potential, so that everyone here might benefit. You’re free to move about, you know, Special Agent, so you can see for yourself how business is thriving and how well and happy everyone who lives here is. I’d like to think I had some small part in that,” he added with studied modesty.

  Had the so-called spiritual leader just inadvertently admitted to eliminating the people who weren’t “well and happy?” Hawk wondered, because they clearly weren’t out and about. Everyone he’d seen so far had the same frozen, unnerving smile plastered on their faces as if anything else was strictly forbidden.

  Hawk took the opening to ask, “I’ve noticed that nobody here seems to be sick. No colds, no allergies…” He allowed his voice to trail off, curious as to what the other man would say.

  Grayson laughed. “Well, we’ve decided to outlaw all that.”

  He made it sound like a joke, but Hawk had an uneasy feeling that the man wasn’t really kidding. It was all about his choices, his preferences, his master plan. Whether he made light of it or not, Grayson was convinced that the world revolved around him—as it should.

  Hell, it was clear that Grayson really did think he was God.

  Chapter 11

  She wasn’t home.

  There were no lights on in the eighty-year-old farmhouse, and her car was nowhere to be seen. He’d knocked three times, anyway, each time a little louder than the last. Each time with the same results.

  There was no answer.

  Hawk remained at her front door another minute or so. Then frustrated, he turned on his heel and walked away.

  But rather than just shrug it off and proceed on to his hotel room for the night, Hawk got into his car and sat there in the dark, waiting. As he waited, he grew progressively restless and apprehensive with each minute that ticked by.

  Where the hell was she?

  Carly had told him that she didn’t stay in town, that she liked sleeping here, in her own bed, where she felt she had some sort of control over her immediate surroundings. In Cold Plains, the ever-increasing number of Devotees of Samuel, as the “faithful” sometimes referred to themselves, made her feel uncomfortable, so she preferred to do her sleeping here. He could well understand that.

  Hawk tried to distract himself by reviewing the information he had on hand, but his mind kept going back to the fact that he’d heard Samuel asking Carly to come by his office once he finished in the auditorium.

  Again, Hawk uneasily wondered why. A series of scenarios kept suggesting themselves in his head, but he blocked them before any of them could completely materialize.

  Maybe he should have hung around himself, Hawk thought. His presence, he was certain, would have been taken as a silent warning to Grayson that he wasn’t to harm anyone or have any of his henchmen harm anyone. Because if he did, everything the self-enamored egotist had built up would come crashing down around his ears faster than a child’s pla
stic building blocks.

  With a frustrated sigh, Hawk debated starting his car and going back to town.

  But if he left now, he might wind up missing Carly if she came to the farmhouse via another route. And if he burst in on Grayson in his office or where he lived, that would completely blow the mission. He didn’t want Grayson alerted to the fact that he and his people were under FBI surveillance. So far, all the so-called charismatic leader thought was that he was some independent FBI agent asking questions about a bunch of dead women and not getting any useful answers in reply.

  The longer he sat in the dark with his imagination attempting to run amuck, the less reasonable and patient Hawk became. He thought about calling Jeffers or Patterson and sending the agent into town to look around, but that, too, would arouse suspicions. Cold Plains wasn’t exactly the kind of town that received a steady flow of outside traffic. It was neither a tourist draw—although from what he’d picked up that was apparently part of Grayson’s plan—nor on the road to somewhere else. There would be no reason for a stranger to pass through without a specific reason.

  Hell, he didn’t care if it made sense or not. She could be in some kind of real danger while he sat here, as inert as Hamlet mumbling his “to be or not to be” soliloquy to himself.

  Fed up with waiting, Hawk was just about to start his vehicle when he saw headlights slicing through the darkened terrain. Removing his key from the ignition, he watched as they drew closer and the car became larger.

  It was Carly’s car. He recognized her headlights. The right one was slightly dimmer than the left. While he wanted to leap out of his own vehicle to ask her why she was so late, he forced himself to remain where he was and calm down.

  Number one, he had no right to make noises like some overwrought, jealous boyfriend, and number two, the fact that she might not be alone—something that truly bothered him—would make his sudden appearance difficult to explain to whomever was with her—especially if it turned out to be either Grayson or one of his many minions.

  So Hawk stayed where he was and impatiently waited. And watched.

  When Carly pulled her car up in front of the farmhouse and got out, she was alone.

  The second he was sure of that, Hawk shot out of his own vehicle like a hastily fired bullet and cut across the front yard. Taking the porch steps two at a time, he caught up to Carly just as she reached the front door.

  Startled, she swung around, her fist drawn back like a prize-fighter in training. She stopped two inches short of making contact and dropped her hand when she saw who it was.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked. Damn but this man was going to wind up giving her a heart attack yet.

  “Checking on you,” Hawk replied, his tone deceptively simple.

  She’d been too preoccupied as she approached the house and hadn’t noticed his car parked outside. Carly drew in a deep breath, then let it go, doing her best to calm her rather shaky nerves. It didn’t really work. She tried again.

  Unlocking the door, she let Hawk inside. “Why?” she asked wearily. “Are you afraid that I’ll suddenly turn into a Samuel groupie?”

  Alerted by her tone that something was off, Hawk moved around to get in front of her. He wanted a better look at her face as she turned on the light. Taking her chin in his hand, he examined her even more closely. Carly tried to turn her head away, but he held her captive.

  “You know better than that,” he told her. His eyes slid over her face. Something was wrong. “What happened tonight?”

  Carly let out a huge, soul-twisting sigh before answering.

  “Nothing.” Then raising her eyes to his, she added, “At least not the way you mean, anyway.”

  Hawk couldn’t decide if she was telling him the truth, or merely trying to spare him because that was the kind of person she was, ready to shoulder rather than share the burden. Even when its weight could very possibly break her.

  “Grayson didn’t touch you?” Hawk demanded.

  The small, disparaging laugh had no humor to it. “Oh, he touched me, all right.” The next moment, Hawk looked as if he would go charging out the door. She grabbed his arm to stop him from letting his emotions get the better of his common sense. “But again, not the way you mean.”

  His temper frayed into combustible strips, Hawk shouted, “Then for heaven’s sakes, tell me what you mean.” The next moment, his better judgment resurfaced and he realized that he owed her an apology for acting like a Neanderthal. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to start shouting at you.”

  She knew he wasn’t shouting at her, but shouting at Grayson by proxy. The frustration that his hands were temporarily tied had gotten the better of him.

  “Apology accepted,” she said, leading the way to the kitchen. “Why don’t you sit down?” she suggested, nodding at the table. “I’ll make us some tea and tell you what happened.”

  She was the one who looked as if she needed to be waited on, he judged. “No, you sit down, and I’ll make the tea,” Hawk offered, reversing the order. “But you can tell me what happened.”

  “Done,” she answered with a faint smile. She all but bonelessly slid onto the kitchen chair. For one second, Carly fought the urge to put her head down on the table and just make this evening, as well as the world in general, go away for a little while. She’d been caught unaware, but she’d gotten through it, and that was all that mattered.

  Hawk was waiting for her. Taking another breath, she began her narrative of the evening’s events, trying to be as succinct as possible. “Grayson decided to welcome me into the fold.”

  Hawk took the battered, red tea kettle from the back of the stove and brought it over to the sink. Turning on the faucet, he started to fill the kettle with water.

  “What does that mean?” he asked guardedly, doing his best to sound calm. The trouble was, where Carly was involved, he had a tendency to remain anything but calm.

  “He made a devotee out of me,” Carly replied quietly, turning her face away from him. She stared out the kitchen window, into the darkness just beyond.

  “He indoctrinated you?” Hawk asked uneasily as he put the kettle on the front burner and switched on the gas jet beneath it. Small, blue flames popped up and danced feverishly beneath the round metal surface.

  “He tattooed me,” she replied through teeth that were slightly shy of being clenched.

  The kettle and its contents were forgotten. Hawk came around to where she was sitting and dropped to his knees before her. He knew what she was saying, but he was hoping that, by some fluke, he was wrong.

  “You mean…?”

  Carly silently nodded. It was stupid to cry, and she didn’t want to. She wanted to yell, to be angry—and she was—but tears came to her eyes, anyway. Upbraiding herself for this weak display didn’t stem their flow.

  She pressed her lips together, drew back the wide, billowing beige skirt from her leg and pulled the material up high so that her right thigh was completely exposed for Hawk to see.

  On it was a small, fresh, black letter D. The skin just beneath it was an angry red. Hawk cringed when he saw it. He swore he could feel the same needle inking his flesh.

  As if his brain was on a five-second delay, he suddenly heard what she’d said. “He does the tattoo himself?” Hawk asked, surprised.

  Carly nodded, telling herself that once this was over and behind her, she would have the tattoo removed, no matter what it took or how painful that process turned out to be.

  “Seems to really enjoy doing it, too,” she told him grimly. “Enjoys the fact that he was inflicting pain ‘artistically.’”

  Hawk rocked back on his heels, suddenly struck by a thought. What she’d just told him was a brand-new piece of information they hadn’t had before. A few tiny pieces of the puzzle came together.

  “That’s probably why,” he said.

  Carly looked at him, confused. Was he talking to himself or to her? “What’s probably why?”

  He glanced up. It made sense now.
“I think I know why our Jane Doe was killed. She had a black D on her hip, except that hers was done with a black marker. She undoubtedly did it in order to blend in. But she didn’t know that the only one who ‘awarded’ those tattoos was Grayson himself.”

  As the light dawned, Carly finished his statement for him. “So when he saw it, Grayson knew she had to be an imposter.”

  “Right, which naturally made him suspicious. Because of what he felt was at stake, he didn’t stop to ask her any questions, he just had her executed.” That still didn’t tell him what the woman was doing there in the first place, but at least they had one of the answers.

  “Executed?” Carly echoed uncertainly, clearly confused.

  Hawk nodded. “That was a detail we kept back from the media.” That way, if a copycat killer suddenly emerged, they would be aware of it. He had no doubts a great many sick people existed who would do anything for their fifteen minutes of fame—or infamy in this case. “Each of the women was shot in the back of the head. A single bullet, execution style.”

  It didn’t necessarily have to be an execution, she thought. “Or shot when they weren’t looking, so they didn’t know what was coming—or get the chance to plead for their lives,” she suggested.

  He hadn’t thought of that. Hawk looked at Carly with a flicker of admiration. “That’s a possibility, too,” he agreed, then grinned. “Not bad.”

  “Thank you.” He saw a small smile struggling to emerge.

  The tea kettle began to whistle, calling attention to itself and the water that was now boiling madly. Hawk rose to his feet again and crossed back to the stove. He opened a couple of cupboards before he finally located two large mugs.

  “He asked me, you know,” she told him, watching Hawk as he poured steaming hot water into the mugs. “Grayson asked if I was serious about becoming one of his ‘chosen followers.’ If I’d said no or that I had to think about it, he would have slammed the proverbial door in my face, just like that—” she snapped her fingers “—and then I probably wouldn’t even be able to get in contact with Mia or talk to her.”