LITMIR.BIZ

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Rook was investigating, but he had little to go on. Harris had seen to that. He’d kept his revelations vague, promising specifics in future visits—keeping Rook’s interest without giving him anything concrete. Rook was in fish-or-cut-bait mode now. At their next meeting, he’d want details.

      But Cal was right, Harris thought. He didn’t care about helping the FBI. He cared about saving his own skin.

      The devil had come for his due, indeed.

      “If you knew everything about me, Harris, you and Cal wouldn’t dare try to double-cross me.”

      As if to further drive home his point, Jesse pressed his thumb onto the tip of his knife, drawing a pearl of his own blood.

      “You’re a violent man, Jesse.” Harris felt some of his former presence on the bench come back to him. He’d never flinched in the face of what he had to hear and see in the courtroom. “You don’t use violence as a tool to get what you want. Violence is what you want.”

      “That’s my secret, is it?”

      “It’s your secret and it’s your weakness. Your obsession.”

      Jesse smirked as he licked the pea of blood off his thumb. “You Princeton types. You’ve read too many Greek tragedies. I want my money. I want everything you and Cal have on me. I want to know what you know.”

      “I’d never use what I know against you, and Cal won’t, either. It’s his insurance policy—to keep you out of his life. Jesse…” Harris gulped in air. Did he dare hope he could negotiate a deal with this man? “Jesse, you can trust me not to talk.”

      “Seeing how you’ve been meeting with an FBI agent, no, you lying son of a bitch, I can’t trust you not to talk.” Jesse sprang forward and placed the knife blade at the side of Mayer’s throat. “I want my money.”

      “I can’t—”

      “You can, Harris. You can get my money.” He lowered his knife and stepped back, the split second of explosive anger dissipated. “We’ll find a way. Together.”

      Through violence, Harris thought.

      Through death.

      “In the meantime,” Jesse said calmly, with a smile so cold it could only be the devil’s, “tell me something. Just between us.”

      “What?”

      “Who was the redhead with Judge Peacham last night?”

      Four

      On Friday morning, Rook awoke early to catch a flight to New Hampshire. His head pounded, and he was in a foul mood. He’d anticipated a very different weekend for himself. He’d expected to show Mackenzie the small Cape Cod house he’d inherited when his grandmother died a year ago. After seven years working in south Florida, he’d been offered an assignment in Washington, his home turf. Leaving him the house was his grandmother’s way of getting him to stay.

      It was on a quiet, tree-lined street in Arlington. His two older brothers lived within walking distance. His younger brother was a short drive away. Andrew was surrounded by Rooks, every one of them in law enforcement. He’d been infected by the Rook sense of responsibility, the hard-working, straightforward Rook values, the Rook propensity for home and hearth. He was thirty-five. The pressure was on. It was time for him to settle down. Time to start a family. All he had to do was look at the work to be done on his house, see the remnants of his boyhood tree house up in the big oak in the backyard, and he could feel it.

      With a soft curse, he headed for the downstairs bathroom. It still had the Cupid wallpaper his grandmother had hung herself, with help from her grandsons. The house sorely needed renovating. A lot of de-old-lady-ing. He’d worked as a carpenter in high school and through college and could do most of the jobs himself. He’d gotten a good start, but he hadn’t had a chance to tackle the Cupid wallpaper.

      He took a quick shower, threw on a suit and headed for the kitchen.

      T. J. Kowalski was at the front door, right on time to take Rook to the airport. Also a special agent with the FBI, T.J. wasn’t impressed with Rook’s rationale for heading to New Hampshire. “Packed and ready to go?”

      “Just about.” T.J. wandered into the kitchen. Except for the two-inch scar under his eye, he was the classic G-man stereotype with his dark, close-cropped hair, square jaw and neat suits. “Your J. Harris Mayer is a dead end.”

      “Maybe.” Rook grabbed a notepad and jotted instructions for his nephew. “I have to know. You drop me off at the airport. I fly to New Hampshire. I look for my missing informant. I fly back tomorrow night. Easy.”

      “Nothing’s easy with you, man. Not these days.”

      Without responding, Rook folded the note, wrote “Brian” in big letters on the outside and propped it up against the pepper mill. His nephew would see it.

      “Mackenzie Stewart’s from New Hampshire,” T.J. said.

      “That’s how she knows Judge Peacham.”

      “And Harris?”

      “Presumably. He used to visit Judge Peacham there. He and his wife rented a cottage on the same lake a few times. He’s taken off—he left me a message yesterday saying he was off to cooler climes. What does that tell you?”

      “It doesn’t tell me he’s in New Hampshire.”

      Rook knew T.J. had a point, but he was restless and didn’t believe Harris had just suddenly decided to get out of the heat. “Checking out Judge Peacham’s lake house makes sense.”

      “Can’t hurt, I guess,” T.J. said, still skeptical.

      “It’s worth two days of my time.” Rook picked up his soft leather bag and nodded to the note. “Think my nephew will see it? He gets back later today from the beach.”

      “Can’t miss it.” T. J. Kowalski wasn’t even pretending to be interested. “Brian’s a good kid. He’s not going to burn down the house. You’re only going to be gone overnight.”

      Brian had surprised and pissed off his parents when he’d abruptly dropped out of college in the spring, then asked his uncle Andrew if he could move in with him for a few months. He’d work, put some cash together, figure out what was next in his life. Scott, his father, a federal prosecutor, had agreed. His mother had gone along with the decision, but she obviously didn’t like it. According to Scott, the eldest of the Brothers Rook, she tended to baby their two boys.

      So far, Brian hadn’t lived up to his end of the deal.

      That was a problem for later.

      When Rook and T.J. headed out, the morning was already a scorcher, the heat wave locked in for another few days, at least. If he was nineteen and unemployed, Rook thought, he’d stay at the damn beach, too.

      A black SUV pulled into the driveway behind T.J.’s car, and Rook recognized the grim-faced driver, Nate Winter. Winter was damn near a legend in the USMS. T.J. had run into him during an investigation in the spring, confirming Winter’s reputation as a serious-minded, impatient hard-ass—and ultraprofessional.

      He got out of the car. “Good morning, gentlemen.”

      “Nate,” T.J. said by way of greeting. “I’ll be in my car. You want Rook here, right?”

      Winter gave a curt nod, and T.J. slid into the car, immediately starting up the engine, the windows shut tight for the air-conditioning. Rook didn’t blame him. Winter was from the same New Hampshire town as Bernadette Peacham and Mackenzie Stewart. In the past thirty-six hours, since learning Mackenzie was friends with Judge Peacham, Rook had done a little research on her. Never too late, he thought.

      “Heading somewhere?” Winter asked casually.

      “Airport.” Rook had no intention of playing games with this man. “I’m flying up to New Hampshire.”

      “I’m

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