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Time to dig into the DC agent. He set to work. A short time later, he’d gotten the basics but dove deeper.
An hour later, he’d found lots of interesting information. The agent was from a wealthy family, had tons of political ties. He pulled up a photo of the guy’s lacrosse team. At least three of his teammates were from political families.
Dusty expanded the picture to look at each of them. Nothing remarkable. Except maybe Porter Rush—and only because he had her on his own mind.
A lot of people had red hair and green eyes. Still, Rush could’ve been Gracie’s brother. They looked that much alike.
Dusty paused with his fingers on the trackpad. When he’d looked into Gracie’s biological mother, Sheila, hadn’t there been something about her involvement in politics? Born in Tasmania, she’d come here interested in the American political system.
She’d worked on a campaign back in the day. If he remembered correctly, it’d been Senator Rush’s, right?
It was a coincidence, had to be. Yet…
He set to work. Two hours later, and he had a firm connection between the Rush family and Gracie Parish. Specifically, her biological mother, Sheila Marie Hall and Rush.
A photo of a young Sheila at Senator Rush’s campaign headquarters, thirty-some years ago, when he’d first run for and won his seat.
Dusty sat back. Did Rush’s son Porter know his dad had an illegitimate daughter? Could be. Porter was running his father’s bid for the presidency. He was probably involved with vetting his own father.
So Porter finds this out somehow and then asks his old friend and teammate, the DC agent, to find out what he could about Gracie.
Why?
Could this be the reason a sniper had tried to kill Gracie? The way these political boys got around an illegitimate kid didn’t seem so bad, but add in the fact that Gracie’s mother had been young, Rush’s conservative background, and the weird mythology that had sprung up around Rush’s daughter Layla—like the good Lord himself had blessed the family with a girl after five boys—then maybe.
But the agent had also asked about Mukta.
Mukta and Rush. They ran in some similar circles. And she’d adopted his illegitimate kid. Did Mukta know it was his kid? He’d bet she did. Made for some awkward party talk, surely.
Come to think of it, Gracie’s adoption was an anomaly. Gracie had been adopted as an infant, but Mukta Parish adopted only older kids, damaged kids, kids with some sad backstory.
Might be the sick way his mind worked, but it seemed Mukta could benefit a lot by holding this information over Rush’s head. Politically a lot. Businesswise a lot. What might a man do to get that kind of monkey off his back?
Fuck. Gracie was in serious danger.
Dusty jolted at the annoying beep, beep of the alarm he’d set to go off whenever Gracie left the club.
He checked his phone. Sighed. Was it too much to hope she’d sit still for one night? What are you up to, Gracie? He rolled out of the chair, grabbed his bat-belt and his keys.
A quick visit to the bathroom, and he headed out of the private entrance and down the wooden steps leading from his room to the driveway.
He jumped into his car, turned the ignition, and checked the tracker on his phone. He’d slipped one onto her phone last night. Huh. She was headed toward the turnpike.
He left the driveway and glanced at his gas. Shit. He’d forgotten to fill it. Damn. This woman was running him ragged.
Chapter 23
Gracie steered her Ford down the well-lit North Philly street lined with duplexes and parked cars. She drove slowly, hoping Cee would respond to her text and run out.
She didn’t. Fishing her cell from the cup holder, she tried calling. No answer, but as soon as she hung up, a text popped up on her phone: I’m still inside.
Really, Captain Obvious? She was tempted to double-park, run up and drag her out. No. Her training wouldn’t let her hang her car out to be marked by anyone who came along.
She circled the block and pulled into a space that hadn’t been vacant the last time around. Parking karma. After locking her car, she quickly jogged back to the house.
Baseball hat and sunglasses hiding her face, she skirted the small metal gate and reached the ajar front door. Ajar?
Her adrenaline woke up like a spooked pit bull. Hearing sharpened. Awareness increased.
Ducking her head, she reached under the brim of her hat and yanked down the silver, light-distorting face mask sewn into the lining. With her face covered, she pocketed her glasses, slipped on her gloves, unholstered her gun, and crept inside.
Three people, two men and one woman, blindfolded, tied up on kitchen chairs that had been dragged into the center of the living room. All three were out cold. She rushed over and checked pulses on each. Steady. Looked like they’d been drugged.
What was going on? The entire floor was a mess, strewn with thumb drives, laptops, and piles of DVDs.
She scanned the area. The room smelled like skunk weed. And ramen noodles. Where was Cee? A startling crash from the basement cranked up the pace on her already pounding pulse.
Gun raised, she stalked into the kitchen—four half-eaten Styrofoam cups of ramen noodles on the table, and the basement door wide open.
Soundlessly, she approached the door, crouched, and sighted around it. The steps down were wooden, thin, worn, and dark. She couldn’t see the bottom. Going down there would be stupid. Dangerous.
Her breath hot against her face mask, she started down the stairway. Instead of using a flashlight, she let her eyes adjust. The worn boards creaked under her feet no matter where she stepped or how lightly she trod. Halfway down there was a chill. And the sour, overwhelming stench of layered body fluids. Piss. Sweat. Vomit. Blood. Cum.
Her heart raised an all-hands-on-deck, all-units-report-for-duty, SOS, and Mayday alarm all in one. It was pitch-black on the last step. Tentatively, she reached forward and hit a heavy felt curtain that hung across the basement entrance.
Pushing it aside, she entered quick, quiet, and ready. The room was large but broken up in sections of wood framing. A red light hung from the rafters.
She scanned what looked like a small studio. A bed and camera were set up with lighting, obviously for filming. A computer monitor on a tall table flashed obscene pictures, screaming women, bloodied, sexual torture.
And by the back door, a heavyset man in all black wearing a face mask trying to get out. He wrestled open a series of locks, including a rusty lock chain.
Gracie aimed at his head. “Hands up.”
Her voice came out as deadly serious, as angry, as she felt. The man froze and slowly raised his hands. Gracie ordered him down onto the cement floor. He backed up and got onto his belly.
How many other people were here? Where was Cee? Gracie moved over to the man and began to check him for weapons. Pressing along the sides of his back, her hand sank into padding. Padding?
“Gracie, it’s me.”
Gracie jumped back. Cee? She pulled her sister to her feet and leaned in close enough to see her fire-brown eyes through the black mask. “Is anyone else here?”
Cee shook her head. “No. Just those perverts upstairs.”
Perverts? Oh God. It all fell into place. Cee was on a mission. The stacks of DVDs on the floor. The people tied up. Cee had set them up. Set them up for who? “What—”
Heavy pounding on the front door ricocheted down into the basement. Cee looked at the back door. “It’s the police.”
Police? She’d called the police while she was still in the house? The sound of police entering. Their loud footsteps echoing on the floorboards.
Toots on toast. They could not get caught here. In a house obviously used for seedy activity, with three people tied up. It would be all over the news. Momma would kill her. Them.
Gracie reached out and q
uietly undid the rusty chain, opened the basement door. A quick scan of the area showed no police. She looked back at Cee, who nodded that she was ready.
Flinging the door open, Gracie ran, with Cee a step behind. She heard a gruff female voice call from somewhere behind her. “Police. Don’t fucking move!”
Chapter 24
The officer’s command echoed around Gracie and Cee as they sprinted across the fenced-in backyard.
Dodging refuse—old sink, mattress, a toppled birdbath—Gracie pivoted so she ran behind Cee, offering her body as some protection to the teen. Not much. The kid was taller.
Cee grasped the rusty fence handle and slid open the six-foot-high wooden gate. The cop yelled again, then shot.
They slipped into the alley. Blue lights flashed at one end. A police cruiser. They turned and ran the opposite way. Police lights bounced into the alley at that end.
Sitting ducks.
They were between two approaching cruisers in an access alley lined with tall wooden fencing. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.
