Trigger Effect

“At least I can do something about getting myself off his radar screen.” She rose, moved to the closet, grabbed her suitcase and plopped it on the bed. “I’m getting out of here tonight.”

“And going where?”

“To some hotel where I can check in under an alias and pay with cash.” She scooped up everything out of a bureau drawer, dumped it into the suitcase. “Can you recommend a place?”

He nodded. “It’s a little less plush than this, but still on the five-star scale. The manager is a pal of mine. If I give him a call, he can have you registered and a room ready by the time you get there.”

She glanced at her watch. “He must be a good pal if you can call him this late at night.”

“His name’s Burke Youngblood and he won’t mind.” McCall’s mouth quirked as he pulled his cell phone off his belt. “Burke lives on-site and he likes to play cop. He’s cut me a good rate in the past just so I would house a couple of witnesses under protection there. Burke keeps a good eye on things.” He angled his chin. “What alias do you want to use?”

“You pick,” Paige said as she emptied another drawer. “That way, it won’t tie to me.”

“Will do.” While McCall punched buttons on his cell, she stepped into the bathroom and gathered her toiletries.

“Burke will have everything taken care of by the time you get there,” McCall said when she carried her tote into the room. “Your alias is Fiona Shepherd.”

“Fiona?”

His mouth curved. “It’s a family name. The place you’re staying is the Ambassador Arms, about a five-minute drive from here. You can follow me there. That way I can make sure you don’t pick up a tail.”

“All right.”

“I’m sure this has occurred to you, Carmichael, but I’m going to point it out anyway. If someone’s looking to find you, all they have to do is wait for you to show up at the training center tomorrow.”

“I know. If I pick up a tail when I leave there, I’ll make sure I lose it.”

“The homicide I snagged today is political, so there’s a lot of pressure to get the case wrapped up fast. That means I won’t be back at your workshop. I’ll call Steve Kidd, brief him on what’s happened tonight. He and Henderson can back you up when you leave the training center. If you do get tailed, they can close in and grab him.”

“Thanks.” Paige checked all the drawers to make sure she hadn’t left any belongings behind.

McCall gave her a scrutinizing look. “It hasn’t been that long since you were a cop, so I figure you’ve still got federal contacts. Are you getting flagged for NCIC off-line searches on Isaac?”

“Yes.” As a high-profile escapee, Isaac was listed with the National Crime Information Center, the national database operated by the FBI that was the world’s largest collection of information on known criminals. If someone thought they recognized Isaac in Des Moines, Iowa, and contacted NCIC, Paige would receive a message on her cell phone.

“The note on the back of his mug shot is enough reason for me to issue a ‘be on the lookout’ to local cops,” McCall said. “If Isaac is here, he’ll need a place to lie low. Food and transportation. For all that, he needs money.”

“We never found all his money. He had tons of it, not just from his psychiatric practice, but an inheritance from his grandmother.” Paige pulled her cleaned coat out of the closet and stripped off the plastic bag. “My partner and I always suspected he’d stashed funds in numbered accounts in various locations. In and out of the country. If that’s the case, he will have made sure he can get that money easily and safely.”

“That’s going to make him a lot harder to find.”

“If he’s found at all. Right now he could be overseas while his pal performs the dirty work here.” Paige slid her laptop into its leather case. She didn’t want to think about the prospect of having to watch her back for all eternity.

“Ready to get out of here?” McCall asked after she shut the lid on her suitcase and set the locks.

“Yes.” She shrugged on her coat, then reached for her purse. A thought had her hesitating.

“Something wrong?”

“It just hit me. I didn’t ask why you showed up at my door. Why are you here?”

“I wanted to see how you’re doing.”

“You’re under pressure to solve a homicide. You could have just called instead.”

“Could have.” Gripping the pillowcase holding the fruit bowl, he moved back across the suite. “Look, Carmichael, here’s the deal. I’ve got three younger sisters who are all OCPD cops. It would take a hell of a lot for any of them to admit they have a problem dealing on their own with whatever comes their way.”

Her chin angled, she said, “Maybe that’s because they can deal with it.”

“Female cops,” he muttered. “Even former ones work hard to act tough.”

“It’s no act, McCall. We are tough. And proving it is the only way to get macho male cops to take us seriously.”

“Trust me, Grace, Carrie and Morgan have delivered that message loud and clear.”

“Good for them.”

“Here’s a news flash from a brother’s perspective. If one of my sisters was out of town and had some escaped psycho killer after her, not to mention getting mugged, then almost checking out while having an allergic reaction, I’d hope to hell some local cop would care enough to lend her a hand.”

Paige stared at him while something warm raced through her blood. Every gesture he made brought the layers of the man beneath that pretty face and cocky grin a little closer to the surface. He wasn’t just a cop who cared about what happened on his turf, he was a man with a soft spot in his heart for his three sisters.

The realization seemed to have too much influence on her pulse. His dark eyes locked on hers. “You going to go all tough on me now, Carmichael? Tell me you’ve got a problem with me helping you out?”

“No, I appreciate everything you’ve done.” Easing out a breath, she slid the strap of her computer case over one shoulder. “Greatly.”

Before he could make a move for her suitcase, she hefted it off the bed and rolled it toward the door.

She glanced at him over her shoulder. “Just don’t be too nice, McCall. You do, you’ll mess up my image of you as a slimeball.”

Chapter 5

Shortly after seven the next morning, a bit sore and fuzzy-brained, Paige settled at the desk in the guest instructor’s office at the OCPD training center. The triple-shot latte she’d picked up at the coffee kiosk off the lobby of the Ambassador Arms had done little to make up for snagging barely three hours of sleep.

She would hit the hay early tonight, she promised herself.

In the meantime, the day stretched out before her like fifty miles of bad road. She had a workshop to teach and a trip to The Epicurean to find out who had ordered the fruit bowl the company delivered to the Waterford. She also needed to locate a pharmacy and fill the prescription the E.R. doctor had written her for another epi-pen. She was using her laptop case as a makeshift briefcase, so high on her list was to find a place to buy a new one. And while she muddled through the day, she would guard her own back in case Dr. Edwin Isaac—or whoever the hell mugged her and left the mug shot under her door—decided to pay her a return visit.

Paige rubbed at an ache in the center of her forehead. When she’d worn a badge, she had savored the feel of a hunt, the tracking, the adrenaline rush when she closed in on her quarry. Now, she was on the wrong side of a hunt. The prey. Instead of a rush she felt a dark edginess. And having to deal with grinding fatigue put her at a distinct disadvantage. The best she could do was close down on her nerves and rely on caffeine to get her through the day.

With regret, she downed the last of the latte and tossed the cup in the trash can. After rooting in her purse for her mechanical pencil, she unzipped her laptop case and pulled out the file folder with the anonymous what-I did-yesterday workshop assignments. She would have preferred to wait to analyze the remainder until she felt sharper mentally, but that wasn’t an option. Not with the workshop ending the following afternoon.

The first chalky light of the February morning seeped in the window at her back while she systematically analyzed assignments. While she worked, the training center came to life with the hum of distant conversation, footsteps and laughter. When Paige began work on the last assignment in the stack, its spidery handwriting made the reading difficult and slowed her methodical examination.

It wasn’t the poor penmanship, though, that heightened her senses and accelerated her pulse.

Feeling herself stiffen up, she rolled her shoulders, then arched her spine while keeping the statement clenched in one hand. Uneasy, she reread the page.

Woke up at 7:30. Decided I would attend the training class on Monday in hopes of learning some secret in interviewing that a person could use in the interrogation that will help him.