Assumed Identity(71)
Bill Houseman nodded. “You can’t prove I’ve done anything. We’re just having a friendly conversation here. You never Mirandized me.”
Jake moved to stand beside Emma and draped an arm around her shoulders. “Ask him if he still has a bruise under his collar from where I put a choke hold on him that night. From what I hear, it leaves a mark.”
Nick Fensom looked like he was ready to rip open Bill’s collar on the spot. “Well, Mr. Houseman?”
Houseman was fiddling with his tie again. “I think I’d like to talk to my attorney now.”
* * *
JAKE WAITED FOR Nick Fensom to escort Bill Houseman to lockup before he went down to the conference room where Robin had given Emma a bottle and was changing her. The hour was late, he was bone tired and he needed a shave. But when he looked into the room and saw how Robin’s face lit up as she played a tickle game with her daughter, and heard how Emma’s laughter filled the room, he smiled.
The moment didn’t last, though. Spencer Montgomery walked up beside him. He pulled back the front of his suit coat and stuck his hands into his pockets. But Jake didn’t believe there was anything casual about the detective’s thoughts and actions.
“We need to verify Ms. Houseman’s statement,” he started, without any preamble, “but the MO she described of her assault matches what other victims have said about the Rose Red Rapist, including some details we’ve never released to the public.” Montgomery watched the mother and daughter show for a few seconds before adding, “If our unsub finds out that baby is his—that we now have his DNA—”
“Then he’ll go after Emma.” Jake glanced over at the detective. “Let’s try to keep that particular story out of the newspapers, okay?”
“Agreed. Ms. Carter has already agreed to let our lab take blood samples from her daughter. Do you think she’s figured out what kind of danger they’ll be in?”
“The woman is too smart not to.”
Jake had been thinking a lot about Robin and Emma’s chances for a happily ever after if he saved his own hide and left K.C. He’d also been thinking about his own chance at happiness if he left the Carter girls behind and someone even more violent than a disturbed young woman and her misguided brother hurt them.
Talk about a guilty conscience.
“Are you staying on as bodyguard?”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Jake vowed.
Montgomery nodded. “Agent Nash stopped by my office this afternoon. I sent him to the Journal to talk to Gabe Knight about those articles he wrote on you. He’s going to call me later tonight. Are you still unavailable?”
Jake was wondering if his instinct to trust Spencer Montgomery was a smart one, or just wishful thinking. “Did this Agent Nash say anything about me?”
“He showed me a picture of you—when you were younger and prettier.” Good one. Jake almost laughed. “He said he’s your handler.”
“Handler?” Jake looked the detective straight in the eye. Nash hadn’t come with a wanted poster?
“He said you were one of the best undercover operatives he’s ever worked with. Apparently, you’ve been listed as MIA for a couple of years now. What happened? Did you go AWOL on a mission?”
He was one of the good guys? That DEA badge in his pocket was his? Then who did he kill? And why was the guy in the trilby hat following him? It was a lot of information to process. And he had no way of knowing how much or little of that information was true until he talked to Nash or the mystery guy in the hat.
“It’s a long story.” Reenergized by the need to verify some answers and possibly get a breakthrough to his missing past, Jake nodded to the detective and headed into the conference room to gather the Carter girls and their things.
“I drink coffee and bourbon,” Montgomery called after him. “Stick around town at least until my task force catches its man, and I’ll buy you a drink and listen to that story.”
A few minutes later, Jake was in the Fourth Precinct parking garage, keeping watch while Robin buckled in the car seat. Her movements weren’t as efficient as usual and that worried Jake. “Tired?” he asked.
At first Robin shook her head. “Yes, but...”
But that wasn’t what was bugging her.
“What is it?”
“Look at how that assault affected Tania Houseman, and the terrible things her brother did because of it.” She pulled a blanket up over Emma and tucked it beneath her chin. Her hand lingered at Emma’s round cheek. “If he is her father, if Emma is the product of a brutal rape—will she ever have to find out?”