Max stood at the coffee machine, making himself a latte. He glanced up and tipped his chin at Leo. He was a tall man with short blond hair and a ragged scar on one side of his face. “The gang’s all here.”
Not quite. Jake was missing.
The familiar burn of guilt ate at Leo, killing any appetite he might have had. He straddled the end of the closest bench next to Ian Slade. The tall, muscular agent cracked a joke that had Harper Prentiss and Julianne Martinez and the team’s general assistant, Christy Burton, laughing. As usual, the good-humored Ian was charming the ladies.
Max moved to the head of the table and sat. “Where are we with the Dupree case?”
“Reginald Dupree isn’t talking,” Harper replied. “He’s lawyered up and so have his henchmen. The US district attorney is spitting mad about it.”
“Angus Dupree escaped—we assume on the helicopter,” Timothy Ramsey, a junior agent, added. He sat across the table from Leo between Harper and another junior agent, Nina Atkins.
“And Agent Morrow?” Max asked, his piercing blue eyes surveying his team. “Jake’s brother, Zeke, has been hounding me for answers. I don’t have any to give yet.”
Leo’s jaw tightened. It had to be tough for Zeke, thinking he’d never see his brother again. Jake had mentioned once he and his brother weren’t close and barely spoke, but still... Family was family.
“The press is also pestering me for a statement,” Christy said with a flip of her auburn hair. “I can’t keep them in the dark for much longer.”
“It’s been a week and no word,” Julianne said, her voice soft. No doubt she was thinking Jake was dead. Leo wouldn’t accept that.
“Angus took Jake,” Leo stated. “We know that. We tested the blood we found at the scene. It was Jake’s.”
Ian swiveled toward Leo. “Why would they take him?”
“For leverage. To get information out of him.” Leo couldn’t help the growl in his voice. He should have had Jake’s and Buddy’s backs.
“Angus might use Jake to reduce Reginald’s sentence,” Harper added.
Ian shook his head, his normal good humor disappearing as he sobered. “If Angus was going to use him, he’d have done so by now, right?”
“Jake has intimate knowledge of our investigation into the Duprees,” Harper said. “He knows that we have Esme Dupree stashed away in witness protection, ready to testify against her brother.”
“But Jake doesn’t have access to Esme’s whereabouts,” Ian pointed out.
Dylan stepped into the room carrying a computer device. “Hey, guys, I received an alert on a crime I think you might want to hear about.” He tapped some keys on his console. “A witness in Settler’s Valley, Wyoming, claims to have seen a man dumping a body into the Blackthorn River. By the description, it sounds like the victim could be Esme Dupree.”
Leo’s stomach muscles clenched. Could the report from Wyoming be true? Had a witness seen Esme Dupree’s dead body? Without Esme, their case would fall apart. “Is the witness reliable?”
“The Settler’s Valley police chief thinks so,” Dylan replied. “A schoolteacher named Alicia Duncan. She saw the killer, who she claims shot at her and her three-year-old son.”
Leo’s breath caught in his throat. A child. Memories assaulted him. He fought them back with the practice of over two decades. He focused his gaze on his boss. “We’ll go. True is the only dog qualified for the task.” True’s specialty was Water Search and Detection.
Max’s eyebrows hitched upward. “Good point. Leo, you and True make your way to Wyoming. I’ll call the US Marshals to verify they haven’t lost our witness. Dylan, contact the nearest SAR team that has a qualified diver and send them to Settler’s Valley. Also get everything you can about this new witness to Leo, as well as any info you can get on the supposed killer.”
“On it.” Dylan pivoted and exited as quickly as he’d arrived.
By the time Leo had showered and changed into khakis and a black, long-sleeve polo shirt with the FBI logo on the breast pocket, Dylan had a dossier on Alicia Duncan ready.
After he had True secured in his special compartment of the official K-9 unit SUV, he flipped through the file on the witness, getting the basics. She seemed legit. A widowed schoolteacher with a young child living with her father. Not some attention-seeking nutcase wasting his time. Leo placed the folder on the passenger seat and set off for Settler’s Valley, Wyoming. He’d interview the witness and then take True to the river. If there was truly a body to be found, True would find the victim. He always did.
“Mommy, I’m hungry,” Charlie whined. “I want sherbet.”
“Me, too, honey.” Stomach cramping with hunger, Alicia smoothed back Charlie’s dark hair as he bent over the coloring book one of the female officers had scrounged up along with a box of crayons. Three hours had passed since she’d come blazing through the police station doors with Charlie in her arms.
The police chief, Dwayne Jarrett, was a friend of her father’s and had escorted her to his office, where he listened to her nearly hysterical account of what she’d seen and that the killer was after her and Charlie.
She wasn’t sure Dwayne had believed her until he’d gone outside to move her car off the lawn, where she’d left it parked near the front entrance, and seen the bullet hole in the back bumper. After that he’d taken her seriously. Like her word hadn’t been enough.
She sighed with frustration and glanced out the office window. The bull pen was filled with officers busy doing whatever they did. She’d spied a vending machine on the way in. Tired of waiting, she decided to take action. “How about we go see if we can find something to eat or drink.”
Hitching her bag over her shoulder, she rose and held out her hand to Charlie. He set aside his crayon and clasped her hand. His tiny fingers curled through hers and love for this little precious gift from God exploded in her chest. She had many regrets about her marriage, but Charlie wasn’t one of them.
She opened the office door, and they slipped out into the hall. She bought raisins and apple juice from the vending machine then ducked into the restroom. After freshening up, they returned to the chief’s office. She’d expected it to be empty, so she was a bit discombobulated to find the chief sitting behind his desk and another man taking up a good portion of the small space.
He had short blond hair and wide shoulders beneath a jacket with the acronym of the Federal Bureau of Investigation on the back. What was the FBI doing here?
Chief Jarrett leaned to the side to see her around the other man. “There you are.”
The federal agent turned. Alicia sucked in a sharp breath. The man had the greenest eyes she’d ever seen, and they assessed her from head to toe with an inscrutable expression that made her want to fiddle with her hair. She straightened to her full height of five-ten. She was so done with being intimidated by men, especially law-enforcement types.
Next to the agent sat a handsome chocolate-colored Labrador attached to a leash held loosely in the agent’s hand. The dog tilted his head at them as if he, too, was assessing her and Charlie.
“Doggy!” Charlie pulled on her hand, trying to escape from her grasp, but she held on tight, not sure how good an idea it would be for her son to launch himself at a K-9 dog.
“No, sweetie. The dog is working.”
The agent’s eyes flared with obvious surprise, and then an appreciative gleam shone