Abandon

Abandon
Carla Neggers

On what is supposed to be a quiet long weekend in New Hampshire, Deputy U.S. Marshal Mackenzie Stewart is viciously attacked at the lakefront cottage of her friend, federal judge Bernadette Peacham.Mackenzie fends off her attacker, but he manages to escape. Everything suggests he's a deranged drifter - until FBI special agent Andrew Rook arrives. With Rook, Mackenzie broke her own rule not to get involved with anyone in law enforcement, but she knows he isn't up from Washington, D.C., to set things straight between them. He's on a case.As the hunt for the mysterious attacker continues, the case takes an unexpected turn when Mackenzie follows Rook back to Washington and finds that Bernadette's former mentor, a once-powerful, now-disgraced judge who has been providing Rook with information, has gone missing. Mackenzie and Rook realize the stakes are higher than either had imagined, and a master criminal with nothing left to lose is prepared to gamble everything.

Carla Neggers

To Bettye-Kate Hall

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

One

Andrew Rook focused on a seed that had broken loose from a thin slice of lemon in his ice water, because if he didn’t distract himself, he was going to jump across the polished, black lacquered table and throttle J. Harris Mayer, the would-be informant who had set up this meeting.

If they switched drinks, Rook thought, maybe Harris would choke on the lemon seed.

They were sitting along the back wall of a quiet bar in an upscale hotel four blocks from the White House. In his day, Harris had served two presidents. But it wasn’t his day anymore. He was an outcast, caught five years ago in a gambling scandal that had cost him his job and his reputation, if not his trust fund or his freedom. Many people—including Rook—believed criminal charges should have been filed against him, but Harris, once a federal judge, had managed to skate.

“We’ve been here a half hour,” Rook said. “Get to the point.”

Harris ran a pinkish fingertip along the rim of his beer glass. He was sixty-nine but looked older. His hands were trembling and heavily veined, a wet cough sporadically rattling his thin frame. Brown spots and moles dotted his fair, finely wrinkled skin and showed through his thin white hair. He wore a starched shirt and a sport coat with one of his ubiquitous bow ties, and his wingtip shoes were polished but had just enough sign of wear to suggest he was a man, nonetheless, who still got around Washington—who still mattered.

Lifting his beer, Harris gave a paternalistic tut-tut. “You have a short fuse, Special Agent Rook.”

“You might want to keep that in mind.”