BAD DEEDS: A Dylan Hunter Thriller (Dylan Hunter Thrillers) Read online

  He reached the window on the right side of the cabin, ducked beneath it without looking inside, then continued around to the back—

  —and found the smashed window pane.

  Well, then. You’re not crazy.

  Rather than stop, he made his way around the rest of the structure, checking out the surrounding trees. Nothing.

  He returned to the broken window. What was he up against? Odds were high that it was a burglar—probably some druggie looking for cash or valuables. Though that didn’t square with the fact that the packed Honda sat unmolested. Who else, then? The odds that he could have been tracked down by some old enemy were vanishingly small. He’d covered his tracks far too well.

  He gave it up. He would know soon enough. Anyone inside surely was aware of their presence now, so the element of surprise was gone. If he tried to make entry through the front door, he’d be a sitting duck for any armed intruder waiting up in the loft or in the bathroom. Same thing if he tried to go in by the side window, where he’d have to do what was done here: break a pane of glass to unlock it, then be completely exposed while he climbed in.

  This window was the least-bad option. It was directly beneath the loft and tucked back in a broad corner alcove, formed by the interior wall of the cabin on one side, and a closet housing the water heater on the other. He’d have some protection from three sides and above as he entered; any assailant would have to confront him directly from the front.

  He decided to use the flashlight first to try to draw the fire of anyone inside. Standing to the right side of the window, his body protected behind the thick log wall, he reached out and aimed the beam through the window, flashing it around the interior of the cabin, listening hard for any sounds of movement.

  After a full minute, he drew no fire and heard no sound.

  Okay. Moment of truth.

  Aiming the flashlight through the broken pane, he took a quick peek at the interior before ducking back. The quick glance revealed only the boxes and bags on the middle of the cabin floor. He did this a couple more times, aiming the beam at different positions around the room. He could only see part of the bathroom.

  He risked a longer look. Crouching beneath the window, he raised his head just high enough to see inside while he directed the beam methodically around the room. He could see most of it, and it looked just as he had left it. The circle of light tracked across the floor and walls and ceiling, across the front door, then across the far wall to …

  He jerked the bright circle back to the front door. To something silvery just above the door. It was hard to make out at this distance … Then the beam caught a bright vertical streak extending from the shiny object down to …

  “Oh Jesus,” he whispered aloud.

  … He stood in the alley in Kandahar, pressed tight against the wall next to the warehouse door, and his hand reached out to the cold metal knob, then slowly turned it and pulled the creaking door open, ever so gingerly, and then there was the flash of a thousand suns …

  His hand began to shake, making the circle of light wobble.

  Annie … Annie almost walked through that door …

  A blinding, murderous rage roiled up in him.

  Just as suddenly, as inexplicably, the rage died. The shaking stopped. Everything turned cold again. Icy cold. He felt his return to his home in the cold, high place. Where he looked down at himself, detached. Aware of little things …

  The faint aroma of wood smoke.

  The rustling of nearby leaves in the frigid breeze.

  The rough, brittle bark of the log wall scraping against his knees.

  And from his cold, high home, he looked down at himself and knew what he had to do.

  TEN

  Ten endless, agonizing minutes while she stared at the cabin door … stared, barely blinking or daring to breathe, worried sick about what was going on inside, waiting for something to happen, dreading that something would happen, hoping this was all some silly mistake or paranoia … stared, willing him to emerge from that door unharmed and to trot over to her and lean down and flash that crooked smile and say, “Everything’s fine, Annie Woods.”

  Luna had come to sit in her lap, seeking and giving a small measure of warmth and comfort. She was purring now, looking up at her, her eyes glittering faintly in the near-dark.

  “Oh Luna,” she murmured, stroking the cat. “Oh Luna … Please let there be some simple, stupid explanation for this … I’m just glad you didn’t wander off. You wouldn’t have stood—”

  Lights came on inside the cabin.

  She caught her breath.

  Five seconds later, her cell chirped. She snatched it up from the passenger seat.

  Saw that it was him.

  “Dylan!”

  “It’s okay, sweetheart. I’m fine, I’m fine. Relax. There’s no one here … But there was. I have to be in here for a few more minutes to do … some tidying up.”

  “I was so worried! I’ll be right in to help—”

  “No!”

  She flinched, shocked.

  “I’m sorry,” he said immediately, his voice normal. “I didn’t mean to yell. It’s just that whoever was here left something behind. I have to attend to it before I come outside. No, don’t ask me to explain right now. Just give me a few moments, love. Okay?”

  She was bewildered. But she trusted him. “Okay. I’ll wait here.”

  “Good. Stay alert, all right? Keep an eye out, in case our visitors return.”

  “I will … I love you, Dylan.”

  “Love you too.”

  Ten minutes later he emerged from the house. He was carrying a paper shopping bag.

  Heart racing, she jumped out of the car and ran to him. He held the bag away from her and gathered her in with one arm and hugged her tight.

  “Oh, Dylan, I was so scared!”

  “Me too,” he said, his voice unnaturally calm.

  She looked up at his face. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

  He looked at her without expression. “Let’s sit in the car. I’ll explain there.”

  Inside, she picked up Luna from the passenger seat and held her. Dylan got in behind the wheel. He held the bag closed in his lap and turned to her. His face looked just as it had at the diner, when he stood to confront the gang. He reached out and took her hand. He stroked the back of it gently with his thumb.

  “Annie, I want you to try to remain calm, okay?” he began.

  “Okay.”

  “Somebody tried to kill us tonight.”

  “What?”

  “I’m afraid so.” He looked down at the bag. “They left a bomb in the cabin.”

  “That’s a bomb you’re holding?”

  “Don’t worry, it’s harmless. I disarmed it. A simple pipe bomb. No transmitter or fancy detonator—just an electrical switch and battery. I learned about these things during my training at Harvey Point, and when I traveled with EOD guys over in Sand Land. They showed me how to disarm far more complicated IEDs.”

  “But why?”

  “I don’t know why. Not yet.”

  “How did they—?”

  “As for the how …” He paused. “They rigged this to go off when we opened the door.”

  She felt numb. Her brain couldn’t process it. Or the calm manner of his saying it.

  “I see that this thing is making you nervous. Here, let me put it on the floor behind us … There. All right. We can only speculate about the ‘why.’ But if I had to bet, I—”

  “Dylan … I was about one second from opening that door.”

  A pause.

  “I know.”

  “I’d already opened the lower lock, and—”

  “I know,” he repeated, his voice tight.

  “—and I was just one second from turning the dead bolt when I heard Luna meow behind me.”

  “Yes.” It was a whisper. “I know. I know.” He was holding her hand too tightly; the other hand rubbed the cat’s head. “Annie. I know … God, Annie—I a
lmost lost you again!”

  She placed the cat gently down on the floor. He fell into her and she pulled him close.

  He held her so tightly that she could barely breathe.

  She stood at the open door of the cabin, scanning the area outside, Beretta in hand. Behind her, he packed the last of their items.

  “So you think it’s probably that gang from the diner, then,” she said. “But how could they find us?”

  “They’re the most likely suspects. As for how they found us, who knows?” He straightened from a box on the floor. “Sorry we can’t stay another night, love. But whether it’s those people or somebody else, obviously it’s no longer safe here.” He looked around. “I’m going to miss the place. But until I figure out who’s responsible and take care of it, we’ll have to stay away from here.”

  “What do you mean, ‘take care of it’?”

  He bent to continue packing.

  She approached and stood over him.

  “What do you mean?”

  He didn’t look up. “I mean I’m going to find out who did this, and take care of it.”

  “No! Dylan—you can’t go there again.”

  She knew that he understood. He got up and went over to the deer antlers hanging on the wall beside the door. She marched after him, her boots thumping across the bare planks.

  “Dylan, you listen to me. You can’t do that.”

  He lifted the mounted antlers off their hook on the wall. “I can’t do what?” He turned and placed the antlers gently atop a cardboard box, then headed for their bathroom.

  “You can’t run around killing people!”

  He wheeled to face her. His eyes were blazing.

  “Tell that to the people who nearly blew you to pieces tonight!” he thundered. “Has it sunk in to you yet what almost happened here? Do you get the fact that our lives were spared tonight only by a cat? I unscrewed the cap on that pipe bomb, Annie. It was filled with nails. You said it: You were one second away from being torn to bits.”

  She stared at him, not knowing what to say.

  “And if I had gone in first, it would have been me. Decapitated and ripped to pieces, right before your eyes—if the blast didn’t get you, too.”

  “I know! I know. I get that. But this is attempted murder. That’s a felony, so we can report it and let—” She stopped.

  He nodded. “That’s right. You see why that’s impossible. ‘Brad Flynn’ reporting a bomb planted in ‘his’ cabin? My whole cover here would unravel. And from there, probably the rest of my life as Dylan Hunter. My life with you.”

  His expression softened, as did his voice.

  “You see why we can’t go to the cops. Which is why I have to deal with this myself.”

  “I can see why we can’t go to the cops,” she said slowly. “But that doesn’t mean you have to go after them.”

  “What are you talking about? Are you suggesting that I just let these sons of bitches get away with this?”

  She knew she had to be careful now. She reached out and took his hands. Entwined her fingers through his.

  “Darling. Listen to me. You know how I’ve been since … since Christmas.” She hesitated, then pushed on. “You know the trouble I’m having, dealing with that. With what we went through. You know how hard it’s been. I can’t have any more of that in my life. The thought of you involved in that kind of violence. I just can’t. I can’t be waiting at home, knowing that you’re out somewhere risking your life, dealing with—” She shook her head. “With the kind of people that would do things like this.”

  “But that’s exactly my point! You’re asking me to allow animals like these to remain on the loose?”

  “Listen to me. Listen to me, Dylan. Yes, we came close to dying tonight. But we didn’t. We’re alive, and we’re lucky that we’re alive. Because we still have a future. I want a future for us. A future for us, Dylan. So yes, I’m asking—I’m pleading with you: Please let this go. For us. Because … because if you don’t, I know I won’t be able to handle it. And … and I know I won’t be able to stay with you.”

  She saw in his eyes the battle being waged between the combatants of indignation, pain, and love. She felt his fingers squeezing hers, so hard that they hurt her. But she didn’t dare say anything, didn’t dare take her eyes away from his. She knew that their future rested in the outcome of the battle in his eyes. And she knew that he knew it, too.

  She felt his fingers slowly relax. Watched the storm of conflict in his eyes slowly clear. Watched the indignation slowly fade—and the love remain. The love, touched only by a residual hint of the pain.

  “I’ll never forgive myself if whoever did this ever harms another soul,” he said, his voice low. Then he raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. “But I’ll never forgive myself if I do anything to hurt you. Or to lose you, Annie Woods.”

  She felt her chin trembling. She tried and failed to stop the flow of tears as he took her into his arms.

  After a while he kissed her.

  “You’d better get back over there and keep an eye on the perimeter,” he said. “I think there are just a few things left in the bathroom. And I have to cover that broken window to keep the critters and snow out. After that, we’ll be on our way and find a motel somewhere down the road.”

  “Okay, but hurry up. Luna must be freezing again in the car.”

  She returned to her station at the door.

  “Hell-o,” he said almost immediately.

  She turned. He was standing at the entrance to the bathroom with a white towel in his hands. He opened and spread it. She saw red stains on it.

  “This was on the floor,” he explained. “I think one of our visitors cut himself. Probably on the window glass when he came in.” He looked at the towel for a moment, then back at her. A slow smile grew on his lips. “Now we have the perp’s DNA sample. I seem to recall that you’re familiar with DNA samples—aren’t you, Annie Woods?”

  She laughed. “Yes, I guess I do know a little about those. So maybe that will help the cops—” She caught herself again. “Right, we can’t go to the police. But I bet Grant can use his law enforcement contacts to do that for us.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m thinking. It’s a long shot that they’d have any record of this guy—I’m assuming it’s a man, not a woman. But still, this might come in handy someday.” He considered it for a moment. “You know, I’ve had a funny feeling about the leader of that gang. He’s a very strange dude. But now because he was arrested, we’ll be able to find out his last name. Wouldn’t it be interesting if this DNA sample matched up with his?”

  “You mean that ‘Zak’ guy.”

  “Yes,” Dylan said. “That ‘Zak’ guy.”

  PART II

  “The dead cannot cry out for justice. It is a duty of the living to do so for them.”

  — Lois McMaster Bujold

  ELEVEN

  Avery Trammel stood at the curving gray-tinted window and looked down upon the city of Washington.

  Jaded as he was, it still reaffirmed his sense of personal power to see the city from a commanding height. And here—from the thirty-first floor of this glass-walled office tower on the bank of the Potomac in Arlington—one sweeping glance could take in, simultaneously, all the iconic structures that symbolized American government.

  They were laid out in the approximate shape of the Christians’ cross. At its head, nearest him on the opposite river bank, the stately Lincoln Memorial. The Jefferson Memorial at the right; the White House at the left; the Capitol dome gleaming in the far distance, representing the foot of the cross. And at the center, at its heart, the Washington Monument, a defiant spear against the gray winter sky.

  Even in his sixties, Trammel’s eyes were sharp as those of a bird of prey: They could discern mid-week tourists moving like tiny colored bugs at the base of the obelisk that this country had erected to honor its founder and father.

  Turning slightly to his right, those sharp eyes settled on
the Pentagon.

  The sight of it transported him back to that night in the fall of 1971, when he sat in grim silence with two others in a dark, roach-infested apartment in Takoma Park, just a few miles northeast of here … sat there, waiting for the phone call that never came. The phone call was to signal them that they were cleared to begin their phase of yet another assault on the Pentagon. Out in their driveway sat the VW Beetle that would transport the bombs, soon to be delivered to them by the cell in New York.

  But hours earlier, a paid FBI informant betrayed the cell. And when the call didn’t come at the prearranged hour, the trio was forced to scatter back into the underground.

  Trammel still felt a tiny pang of anger, rising across the span of almost forty years …

  His reverie was interrupted by voices behind him. He turned to see a group entering the sleek, modern conference room. At the center of the pack, turning to his companions like the hub of a wheel, strode Ashton Conn.

  Their eyes met, and they both nodded. But as a symbol of their respective power in this city, he remained at the window, waiting for the United States senator to come to him.

  “Avery!” the man sang out, angling past the conference table, his right hand outthrust. “It’s been so long!”

  He endured the politician’s pumping handshake and too-familiar grip on his shoulder. Conn’s smile was broad, like his face and his waist. Though he was in his mid-forties, not a single strand of gray intruded upon the bronze sweep of his thick, straight hair—a tribute to the meticulous craftsmanship of the Capitol’s stylists. But drink and worse had transformed his face, once lean and tanned and handsome, into something fleshy and ruddy and dissolute. Folds of puffy flesh hid the color of his eyes behind narrow slits; only memory informed Trammel that they were an intense blue.

  Still, he thought, Conn looks like he belongs in this town of power and prestige—standing here flashing the perfect teeth, the impressive Cartier Santos watch, the obligatory oval Harvard Law School ring, and the well-tailored Armani suit at least half as expensive as his own. He wondered: Does Conn belong in this town or to it?