“Sure does. Any idea who was tracking him?”
“Traced the serial number to the vendor. The tracker was purchased by the wife, Tassi Standish.”
Tassi must have suspected Spencer was up to something, whether having an affair, stealing her share of the proceeds from the Ponzi scheme, or both. “Thanks, Sanchez.”
Leah turned in her seat to face him. “I’ve got it,” she said. “I know why Beth was so scared that she ran—she thought it was the only way to keep her baby safe.”
“The missing gold,” Luka replied. “The killer thinks Spencer gave it to Beth and she knows where it is.”
“Exactly.” Then she frowned. “Six million dollars’ worth of gold—that’s got to be pretty bulky and heavy. There definitely wasn’t anything like that at the cabin. And Beth had nothing with her at the fair.”
“She wouldn’t need to. You can buy gold and have it held for you at a secure depository. If Spencer was planning to fake his death and leave with Beth, I’ll bet he arranged for an offshore bank to hold either the physical gold or bearer bonds backed in gold.”
“Then why go after Beth?”
“Some of those places don’t need a physical key—a special code will do. Spencer probably has fake IDs for himself and Beth, along with anything needed to access the six million waiting at wherever he and Beth were headed. If I were him, I’d go south to a Florida port city, take a boat over to the Caymans or someplace like that.”
“So Spencer hid Beth in the cabin until he was ready to make their escape. Tassi tracked him with the GPS but before she could confront him, he was killed—” She stopped. “You’re sure it wasn’t her?”
Luka shook his head, concentrating on the road ahead. “Her alibi checked out.”
“Okay, Tassi didn’t kill him. At least not herself—maybe she asked Larry to, promised to run away with him or something. And tonight, when Foster Dean caught up to them both, he tortured Larry and Tassi told him about Beth and the cabin. So Dean took Tassi with him and when he didn’t find Beth and Tassi couldn’t tell him any more, he killed her.”
Luka frowned. The only good thing about the scenario Leah proposed was it meant that Dean didn’t have Beth and the baby. Yet. “And now he’s after Beth.”
“But Beth might not even know what Spencer’s plan was—she was hidden in the cabin for the past few weeks.”
“If Dean’s the killer, then he’s desperate,” Luka said grimly. “He can’t go back to the Zapata family empty-handed, and he knows we’re closing in. He’ll do whatever it takes.”
“And if it’s not Dean? If he’s getting close to finding the money, then the real killer might target him next.”
Luka shrugged. Too many unknowns and too little in the way of hard facts. He turned into the lane leading to Holy Redeemer and cut his lights, slowing so that the car would make the least amount of sound possible. The church was dark except for a single dim bulb over the rear door, but the house next to it blazed with lights. Harper’s car sat out front along with a minivan and two matching white SUVs with the Holy Redeemer logo. No signs of Dean’s Tahoe.
Luka stopped and backed into the church’s parking lot, placing the building between him and the house. He called in to dispatch. “What’s the ETA on my back-up?”
“They’re twelve minutes out.”
Damn. “We need to wait,” he told Leah as he texted Harper to ask for an update. He wanted Harper out of there but without knowing the extent of the reverend’s involvement, he didn’t want to give too much away in his message.
As he waited for her reply, a loud crack sounded. Luka grabbed the car’s radio. “Shots fired, I’m going in. Repeat: shots fired.”
He jumped out of the car, ignoring the pain in his leg. This was no time for crutches. “Keep low,” he ordered Leah. “Stay here, help is on the way.”
He left without waiting for her reply. One of his team was in that house. If Harper had fired the shot, she’d be calling in. Or answering his damn text.
Nothing. Only silence. Which made him run faster.
Forty-Two
Harper cursed herself for being out of position to deal with the threat Dean posed. With no chance to reach her weapon, she instead eased a step back until she was positioned against the corner, the closest thing the room had to a blind spot for someone entering from the hall. She’d been focused on John, and years of parishioners ringing the Reverend’s doorbell at all hours of the day and night had dulled her senses. Any other house and she’d have been immediately alert to danger.
At least those were the excuses that ran through her brain—another childhood-conditioned response, one that she thought she’d left far behind, this immediate search for quick and easy explanations for her failures. Because they were always hers to own, always the result of her inability to make the right choice. She’d been struggling so hard to make her father proud of the path she’d chosen that now, at the crucial moment, she’d let everyone down.
Harper edged sideways, her gaze meeting the Reverend’s. To her surprise he widened both eyes, as if relegating any decision-making to her. She’d been angry that Luka hadn’t given her more duties on the Standish case, but she now realized that it worked in her favor because Dean had never seen her, had no idea she was a police officer. Harper brushed at her waistband where her gun and badge usually were, and the Reverend gave her the tiniest nod of acknowledgment.
He stood tall, stepping toward the threat, bringing Dean’s focus to him. “What are you doing here?” he demanded, ignoring the gun to his wife’s head. It was all show, Harper knew, detecting the faintest quaver in his voice. He was trying to distract Dean, give her an opening. “How did you get here?
