Tough Justice Series Box Set: Parts 1-8

She was vaguely aware of Nick asking questions while she stared at the array of photos that surrounded the television on the shelves.

An ornate silver frame held a picture of John and Heather on their wedding day, both looking painfully young and blissfully happy. There was a picture of Tina getting on a school bus. She’d been brown-haired and blue-eyed just like her mother and had a beautiful smile that would light up any room.

The photos were the chronicles of the life of a beloved child. First day of school, first missing tooth, a romp at the beach...each picture was like a small dagger plunged into Lara’s heart.

There would be no more photos to add to this particular collection. There would be no first date or prom, no first day at college or any other momentous occasions frozen in time by a camera.

Her gaze fell on a photo of Heather holding a newborn Tina wrapped in a pink blanket. Lara stiffened, drinking in the picture and easily imagining the softness of the blanket, the sweet scent and the soft coos of a baby held in loving arms.

She reeled away from the pictures, unable to stand looking at another one. Nick was showing John and Heather a photo of Lara Bowman. “Has either one of you ever seen this woman before?” he asked.

They both looked at the picture and then shook their heads. “Did she have something to do with Tina’s kidnapping?” Heather asked in a faint, trembling voice as she swiped a tear from her cheek. “I mean, we know now that Sean Dunst actually took Tina, but did this woman have a hand in it, too?”

“No, nothing like that. She’s another victim. She was found murdered yesterday morning on a jogging trail in Central Park,” Nick explained.

John frowned. “Then what does she have to do with what happened to Tina?”

“We’re trying to tie together several cases but can’t really tell you any more than that,” Nick replied.

“Nobody can tell us anything,” John said, his anger back in his voice. “Nobody can tell us why this Dunst person chose Tina or why he held her for a two whole weeks before killing her. Was she specifically chosen, or was she just so cute he couldn’t resist her when he saw her?”

“She was such a good girl.” Heather began to rock back and forth, tears oozing from her eyes. “She never gave us any trouble. Before she’d leave for school each morning she’d tell me she loved me much much. ‘I love you much much, Mommy.’ That’s what she’d say every day. Now I’ll never hear her sweet little voice again.”

Out. Lara needed out.

No matter how thick she’d believed her defenses to be, this house, this very room held too much raw grief. It was strangling her, and she couldn’t draw enough air. She shot Nick a quick glance and then left by the front door. She stood on the stoop and drew in deep breaths in order to get hold of herself.

Loss pierced through her like a jagged dagger. Her chest ached as if she’d received the stabbing knife wounds that had stolen the life from Lara Bowman.

Was Lara at the center of all this? Were these deaths happening because of her? No, she couldn’t think that way; otherwise she’d lose her mind. They’d figure this out. They’d catch the people responsible. Failure simply wasn’t an option.

She took another deep breath and drew on the place inside of her that held no emotion, the place of toughness that was her strength. While undercover she’d seen plenty of young victims, and she’d had to stuff her feelings away in a place where they couldn’t be accessed. It had been the only way for her to survive.

By the time Nick finally joined her on the stoop she had managed to get herself under tight control again.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” she snapped sharply and hurried down the stoop to his car. His simple question had managed to twist emotions and feelings she didn’t want to possess all out of whack again.

She’d believed her emotions had died first in the year undercover and then in the time that she’d spent in the safe house. After all she had done, after everything she had seen while undercover, she’d needed to numb herself in an effort to stay sane. It was still a coping mechanism that usually served her well.

They got into the car, and thankfully Nick remained silent. Lara had gone to the dark side of her mind, and at the moment she didn’t want any intrusion. Images from the past ripped at her soul as she lost a battle to clear her mind.

By the time they’d driven for a few minutes, she looked out of the window and frowned. “Where are we going?” They were headed toward the East Village, not back to the agency.

“Just trust me,” he replied.

She looked at him warily and sat forward, the seat belt cutting into her chest. At the moment she was too fragile to trust anyone. “Nick, you’d better tell me right now where you’re taking me before I open the door and bail.”

“Take it easy, Lara,” he said with a touch of irritation. “I’m taking you someplace where we can have a beer or two and kick back and relax for a little while. I think we’ve both earned it after this last interview.”

She leaned back and drew in a deep breath. God, she’d stab somebody in the eye right now for a cold beer and a chance to clear her mind.

He parked along the street in front of a small pub named O’Toole’s. “My apartment building is on the next block. I come here often just to unwind,” he said as they walked toward the front door.

Inside the place was relatively small. The booths had red leather seats that matched the stools in front of the long dark wooden bar. It was one of those neighborhood joints where everyone knew your name, and on this Sunday afternoon there were only two men seated at the bar watching a muted television showing a football game.

U2 played softly overhead as Nick led her to a booth where he slid into one side, and she slid into the other. Immediately a saucy red-haired young woman with a sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose appeared at the side of their booth.

“Hey, Nick,” she said and then offered Lara a friendly smile. “What can I get for you two?”

Within minutes they each had a frosty mug of beer in front of them. Tension still knotted in the pit of Lara’s stomach from the visit to the Coles. She wasn’t sure if having a beer with Nick was a good idea or not. But, she definitely wasn’t ready to go home to her apartment and be alone with her thoughts.

“Tough interview,” he said and took a drink of his beer.

“The worst,” she agreed. “Thanks for doing it. I hate having to talk to people who have lost their children.” She took a long draw of the beer. “One of the horrible things of working undercover in the Moretti organization was knowing that he was trafficking children and not being able to do a damn thing about it without blowing my cover.”

“How did you manage to hook up with the organization in the first place?” His dark eyes gazed at her curiously.

Lara leaned back in the booth and took another drink of the beer before replying. Memories of that time rose up to form a lump in the back of her throat. She coughed and swallowed hard against it.

“The FBI did a great job creating an alias for me, complete with a background as a minor arms runner in Chicago. I spent a couple of weeks hanging out in a bar that I knew several members of the Moretti syndicate frequented, and it was there I connected with the organization and was taken in, running guns for them.”

She paused to take another drink and then continued. “I’m sure I was thoroughly checked out before being brought onboard. The FBI created a life for me that included an arrest for illegal gun sales. According to the fake records, the charges were dropped due to lack of evidence, but it was enough to get me into the organization. Then it was just a matter of time, and slowly gaining everyone’s trust. I ended up working for the most reprehensible people who were doing terrible things, and I also discovered some of them had dualities to their personalities.” She finished her beer in two deep swallows. Don’t think about Andrew. Not here, not now. Not ever.

“Yeah, but it’s not like a trained, professional agent like you would be taken in by some stupid sob story from drug dealers and human traffickers.” Nick gestured the waitress for another round of beers.

“I never lost sight of the ultimate goal, but I’ll admit that a few of the people got a little bit under my skin with their stories. Like there was one drug courier who got into the business because his son needed expensive cancer treatments, and he needed cash to pay the medical bills.”

She stopped talking as the waitress delivered their drinks. When the woman had left their booth Lara took a sip of the fresh beer and then shook her head. “I don’t want to talk about all of this anymore. We’ve got enough to deal with in the here and now.”

For a long moment she was mired in the events of the past couple of days. Little Tina’s murder, Dunst’s execution and Lara Bowman sprawled dead on a jogging trail...an upward spiral of anger filled her.

“I’ll tell you what will really piss me off,” she finally said aloud. “If we find out that Lara Bowman was killed only because she shared the same spelling of her name as mine.”

A grad student, working to stay healthy, a woman with a bright future ahead of her and a man who had loved her...her life snuffed out by a knife in the heart because she had the misfortune to be named Lara. A heavy weight sat in Lara’s stomach.

Again she was plagued by doubts. Was she smart enough to handle what might be coming her way? Was she really competent to do the job?

She sighed and fought against an encroaching darkness from the past that threatened to consume her.

Nick was silent for several long minutes and then finally spoke. “Five years ago my partner was killed because I wanted a sandwich.” His deep voice held a hollowness that rang a like chord inside her.

“Jimbo, that’s what everyone called him,” Nick continued. “He was a big man, with an even bigger heart. Everyone loved Jimbo. He was constantly dieting, and on that particular night the last place he wanted to stop was at a deli shop, but I insisted. It was stupid and selfish, but I told him just to wait in the car, and I’d run in and grab my sandwich. I’d just paid for my order when I heard the gunshot.”

He stopped talking for a long moment and then finally continued, his eyes focused into his mug. “Some bastard had crept up on the car and shot him through the head. He never had a fighting chance. We didn’t catch the shooter. We believed it was probably somebody we’d arrested at some point or another. Jimbo was dead because I wanted a damned pastrami on rye.” He looked up at her with haunted eyes.

She didn’t speak. There was nothing she could say. Lara knew all about guilt, and there was never anything anyone could say to make it go away. Something like that was a mark on your heart forever.