“I’m afraid Griff is concentrating so much on a possible connection between the Powell Agency murders and the rumor in Europe about Malcolm York being alive that he isn’t giving consideration to any other possibility.”
“Sanders says there is no way York can still be alive.” She lowered her voice. “When they left the island, York was dead. They were certain of it.” Barbara Jean preferred not to think about the fact that Sanders was more than capable of cold-blooded murder, as were Griff and Yvette. She understood why they had killed York and knew in her heart that under the same circumstances, she would have done what they did. They had destroyed the monster who had tortured them with such great pleasure.
“Griff says the same thing.” Nic stood to her full five-ten height, her feet bare, her long, tan legs clad in white walking shorts. An oversized orange and white UT T-shirt hung loosely to her hips. “He’s convinced that someone in Europe is using York’s name, but he has no idea who or why.”
“I know very little about the years Sanders spent on Amara, only that he blames York for the death of his wife and child, and that York forced him to do some terrible things.”
“I’ve grown to hate Malcolm York with every fiber of my being.” Nic walked to the edge of the patio and gazed out over Douglas Lake. “Even after all these years, he still haunts Griff.”
“As he does Sanders and Yvette.”
At the mention of Yvette’s name, Nic glanced over her shoulder at Barbara Jean. “They both love her, you know. My Griffin and your Sanders.”
“Yes, I know. And she loves them. But . . .” Barbara Jean paused, hoping to find the right words. “Griff worships the ground you walk on. You are the love of his life. Never doubt that for a moment.”
Nic offered Barbara Jean a forced smile, then looked back out over the lake. “I don’t doubt his love for me. But as long as he doesn’t trust me with the complete truth about his past, that past will stand between us.”
Maleah was in the driver’s seat. Derek had learned early on during their partnership on the Midnight Killer case that she preferred being the driver. Since he couldn’t care less, he hadn’t put up a fuss about it. No doubt it had something to do with her personal control issues. The lady most definitely had a problem with any man—but him in particular—being in charge of her.
He kicked back and relaxed as she headed her Chevy Equinox southeast on GA-30 E / US-280 E. If they weren’t delayed by roadwork or accidents blocking the highway, they should be at the prison in about twenty minutes. Even though their scheduled visitation with Browning was at ten, Maleah had insisted on leaving the hotel at nine.
“I’d rather get there early and have to wait than run the risk of our being late,” she’d told him.
He had learned the hard way not to argue with her over insignificant matters. He chose his battles. Otherwise, they would be at each other’s throats all the time. In the beginning of their professional association, they had disagreed on everything. If he said the sky was blue, she’d say it was gray. If he said the sun was shining, she’d say it was partly cloudy. If he voiced an opinion she didn’t like, she’d call him an arrogant jerk.
“Do you want to go over anything again before we get there?” he asked.
“No. I think we’ve talked the subject of Jerome Browning to death, don’t you?”
“Probably. Just remember—don’t underestimate him. And don’t expect him to give us anything without wanting something in return.”
“I’m not an idiot, you know.” She kept her gaze fixed on the road ahead.
He wanted to reply that no one had said she was an idiot or even thought it. A prickly pear, yes. High-strung and confrontational, yes. But instead, he asked, “Mind if I find some music on the radio?”
“Be my guest. But please make it something soothing.”
He found a “lite sounds” station, the first tune, a relaxing piano concerto. “Does that meet with your approval?” he asked.
“It’s fine.” When she glanced his way, he smiled and winked at her. She frowned and hurriedly looked away, returning her gaze to the view through the windshield.
Ignoring her completely, he closed his eyes. His mind immediately focused on Jerome Browning.
Derek hated the deals law enforcement made with criminals, plea-agreements that allowed lesser sentences in exchange for information. The DA who had prosecuted Jerome Browning had been forced into one of those god- awful deals. Browning, who should be on death row, was instead locked away in the maximum security division of the penitentiary. He had brutally murdered nine people, five women and four men. But not long after his arrest the authorities learned that he had killed before, when he had been a teenager. Twenty years before Browning had been arrested and charged with the Carver murders, a series of six missing teen girls in Browning’s old neighborhood had been presumed murdered. Their bodies had never been found. And all six cases had remained unsolved. Browning had bargained for his life—and won! He had agreed to confess to the murders of the six teen girls and tell the police where they could find the bodies. In exchange for the information that could bring closure to six families, Browning had been granted life imprisonment instead of the death penalty he deserved.
Browning would spend the rest of his life behind bars, but he was alive. Like the families of the people he had murdered, Derek believed that Browning should have been executed.
Everything Derek knew about Browning forewarned him that Maleah would be facing a deviously clever psychopath, one who would not hesitate to use her for his own amusement.
But Maleah was no featherweight in any battle of wills. She was strong, tough, and smart; and God help her, she never gave up on anything or anyone she believed in with her whole heart. He didn’t know what demons she had fought and won in her past, but he saw beyond the exterior beauty to the deep scars inside her. Maleah Perdue was a survivor.
Derek suspected she just might be a worthy opponent for Browning.
But at what cost to her?
Griffin Powell had entrusted Maleah to Derek, expecting him to keep her safe and protect her from emotional trauma. Griff had a protective attitude toward all of his employees, but Maleah was special to him because she was his wife’s best friend. And the big man possessed an exaggerated sense of responsibility when it came to the people in his life, especially the women. Apparently, on a subconscious level, Griff thought of women as the weaker sex. He was, in so many ways, an old-fashioned gentleman. A good old Southern boy, raised the right way by his mama.
Derek might have been born with a silver spoon in his mouth and Griff a poor boy, but Griff was far more of a gentleman than Derek ever had been or would be. Derek had spent most of his life rebelling against his mother, his family, and the inherent snobbery and selfindulgent lifestyle that inherited wealth so often imposed on the heirs to multi-million-dollar fortunes. From his early teens, he had deliberately done the unexpected, anything and everything to piss off his mother and grandparents, and to snub his nose at the society in which they existed. Military boarding school had been their solution. His response had been to skip college after high school graduation and bum around the world like a penniless vagrant. He had certainly seen the world through the eyes of a man who had to earn his keep wherever he went.
At twenty, flat broke and determined not to touch his trust fund, he had joined a group of unsavory characters, a sort of ragtag group of wannabe mercenaries, bluffing his way into their fold. He had learned later on that he hadn’t fooled them and they hadn’t expected him to survive his first mission. He’d been nothing more to them than an expendable foot solider.
At twenty-four, he had returned to the States, worldweary and old beyond his years. Then he had taken just enough money from his trust fund to attend Vanderbilt and had graduated summa cum laude. He came from a long line of highly intelligent savvy businessmen and his family had expected the prodigal son to take his place in the business world alongside his uncles and cousins. He had shocked them all when he had joined the FBI.
“Are you asleep?” Maleah asked Derek.
“Nope.”
“We’re almost there.”
He opened his eyes and sat up straight. “Have you ever been inside a maximum security prison before today?”
“No, I haven’t.” She paused just long enough to inhale and exhale. “I suppose you have.”
“Yes, I have.”
“I don’t need another lecture, so whatever you were going to say, keep it to yourself.”
