Mackenzie almost smiled. “Okay.”
Bernadette sighed through her tears. “I swear you are the most resilient person I’ve ever encountered. I didn’t mean to bite your head off.” She got to her feet, waved a hand at her suitcase. “I’m not even sure what I’ve packed. Scarves and mittens, for all I know.”
“I should go,” Mackenzie said.
“If I see Cal before I leave, I’ll talk to him. Promise. But right now I don’t have a clue why he’d turn up at Andrew Rook’s house.”
When she returned to her car, Mackenzie fought an urge to head north, back to New Hampshire. She could fulfill everyone’s expectations and just drop out of the Marshals Service. Go write her dissertation. Carine had offered her the use of her studio, a tiny place just up the road from the 1830s brick house where she, her husband and their baby lived.
“You’re going to pass out, Deputy Stewart. Think of what I’m going to do then.”
How long would she be looking over her shoulder for this man? Moving back to New Hampshire wouldn’t solve anything. He’d still be out there, and she’d still have to wonder when he’d jump out of the bushes again, when he’d call her in the middle of the night, when he’d leave her some creepy present.
What she had to do was find him.
She took two wrong turns on her way back to Rook’s house. Denial, she thought when she got there, raising her hand to knock on his front door. But it opened, and he stood there in jeans and a T-shirt, looking so damn handsome she had to give herself a mental slap. Falling for him all over again wouldn’t help her find her attacker.
“Save me any pizza?” she asked.
T.J. was at the kitchen table with Brian Rook, who immediately excused himself and headed upstairs. He referred to his uncle as Andrew. Not Andy or Drew – just Andrew – and Mackenzie supposed she’d gotten herself into a bad habit, calling him Rook.
He put a slice of pizza on a plate and handed it to her at the table. “It’s warm, not hot.”
“It’ll be fine. Thanks.”
T.J. pushed back his chair but didn’t get up. “We got hold of Cal Benton and talked to him. We’ll talk more tomorrow. He apologized for not giving Brian his name.”
“Did he say why he decided to stop here?” Mackenzie asked, taking a bite of her pizza. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was. It seemed like a week ago that she, Juliet and Ethan had stopped for a quick bite before checking out house listings in semiaffordable neighborhoods.
“He said it didn’t occur to him that coming here would be a problem.” T.J. shrugged. “He was married to a federal judge. He didn’t think twice about knocking on Andrew’s door.”
“Was Brian unnerved?”
Rook came into the kitchen and shook his head, taking the chair between his partner and Mackenzie at the round table. “Brian doesn’t have nerves, I swear. He could have called his father or one of his other uncles – or me – if he was scared. He wasn’t.”
“Cal’s not a particularly scary guy. What did he want?”
The two men were silent. Finally, T.J. said, “Harris Mayer knocked on our door about a month ago insisting he could help us break open a case involving blackmail, extortion, fraud and bribery. Money exchanging hands illegally among rich Washington types. People threatened with exposure of secrets.”
“Threatened with violence?” Mackenzie asked.
Rook answered. “Harris hasn’t indicated violence is a factor. We’ve met a few times, but he’s always vague. It’s been hard to gauge whether he just wants to be part of the action again and is making up stuff to get our attention, or if he’s for real.”
“He likes pulling people’s strings,” T.J. added. “Pulling our strings – he knows we’re not going to hurt him. That doesn’t mean someone else won’t.”
“If whoever’s behind the blackmail and whatnot realized he was talking to the FBI…” Mackenzie didn’t finish; she didn’t need to. “A good reason to disappear. What’s Cal’s involvement?”
“We don’t know,” Rook said. “He and Harris met through Judge Peacham and have gotten together a few times in recent months. By itself, that’s nothing. Put it together with everything else that’s gone on in the past week, and who knows.”
Mackenzie thought a moment, pictured the man leaping out of the brush next to Bernadette’s shed. His colorless, soulless eyes. “Do you think my guy – the man who attacked me and presumably left me the little gift on my porch steps – is part of this blackmail and extortion scheme?”
Rook’s gaze stayed on her, but T.J. was the one who spoke. “We don’t know.”
“Bernadette?”
“The same,” T.J. said.
“I’ve known Beanie Peacham all my life, and I can remember Harris coming to the lake with his wife and kids when I was nine or ten. I attended Beanie and Cal’s wedding.” Mackenzie sighed, no longer in the mood for pizza. “Well, Rook, no wonder you dumped me.”
She thought she saw T.J. smile, but he quickly got to his feet. “I wish we could have happened along tonight just as this SOB was leaving that knife and flower for you, Mackenzie. Whether he’s mixed up with our business with Harris or not, the guy’s a creep. We’ll get him.”
“Damn straight.” Mackenzie smiled. “Thanks, T.J. Maybe the neighbors saw something that’ll help. The house is tucked back on the property, but – well, who knows. I’m just glad Sarah wasn’t there.”
At the mention of Nate’s wife, T.J. visibly gritted his teeth, his look sober. “A bunch of crazy-assed vigilantes tried to take Sarah out in the spring. Something about that house, I swear. Time to improve security there, if you ask me.”
Mackenzie remembered the uproar in the spring. Nate, Juliet Longstreet and undercover marshals from California had been involved. She’d just started her training and couldn’t wait to get her first duty assignment. But she said, “I don’t suppose security will help much with Sarah’s ghosts.”
T.J. rolled his eyes but managed a grin. “I’m out of here. See you two tomorrow.”
After T.J. left, Rook poured Mackenzie a whiskey and set it in front of her. “You look like you could use a drink, Deputy Stewart.”
“A couple sips, anyway.” She picked up the glass, staring into the amber liquid. “I want to find the bastard, Andrew. And Harris. And Cal -”
“It’s not your fault he showed up here. Just do your job, Mac. That’s all anyone’s going to ask of you.”
She took a swallow of the whiskey, remembering her attacker’s colorless eyes. She set the glass down and looked at Rook, on his feet now, leaning back against the counter. It was a comfortable house, with homey remnants of his grandmother and the masculine touches he’d added.
And a nephew upstairs, she thought.
“Leaving the knife was this bastard’s way of telling me he could have killed me last Friday.”
“He didn’t kill you.”
“Maybe he could have and was just – I don’t know.”
“Just letting you think you’d kicked his ass?”
“I disarmed him. If I’d kicked his ass, he’d be in jail right now instead of wherever he is.” She took another swallow of the whiskey, then asked abruptly, “Where did you do your first assignment?”
“South Florida.”
She kept her eyes on him. “Did you have doubts?”
“I come from a family of cops. Doubts were never my problem.” He smiled at her. “The opposite. I was pretty cocky. I was always in a hurry, didn’t like to question myself.”
She drank more of the whiskey, pointing the glass at him. “You’re still cocky, Rook.”
“But I’m more measured. Mac, you didn’t hesitate last Friday. If you’d hesitated, you wouldn’t be getting stitches out tomorrow. Everyone who knows what you did realizes that you’ll have their back in a fight. You won’t run when the action gets real.” He shrugged. “Armed and in your marshal’s duds, you’d be tough to beat.”
She got up and brought her glass to the sink, turning to him. “Thank you – and T.J., too. Calling you after I saw the hydrangea and the knife seemed like the thing to do.”