No answer.
She reached out and pushed the bell. A brief spurt of guilt caused her to cringe as she did. Her father’s influence had extended to bell-pushing. Christ, she thought to herself. How pathetic.
She pushed the bell a second time with more confidence, holding it longer this time.
But again, there was no answer.
Adele slowly unbuttoned her holster and sidestepped to the nearest window. She frowned, pressing her forehead against the cool glass.
Through the window, she spotted a tidy room with an old grandfather chair facing a fireplace and a long kitchen table with a laptop.
Her eyes narrowed, staring at the laptop, trying to register what she was seeing.
A face on the laptop stared back at her.
A face she knew.
“Shit,” she said, uttering the word in tandem with a huffing breath.
The laptop had a picture of her father’s face displayed on the LED screen. Adele’s gun ripped from its holster and she kicked at the door. Once, twice, leading with her heavy boot, but the door held firm. With an urgent huff of air, she sprinted around the side of the house and hopped a low, ridged wooden fence. Ignoring a bed of roses, she tore through the flowers and circled the backyard. A home gym was stationed beneath a tree, complete with a workout bench, weights and an old rowing machine beneath a tarp.
She ignored the strange set-up and surged toward the back door. This one was brittle, old—a wooden affair with chipped, flecked paint and a small glass semicircle which reminded her of the sections of an orange.
She kicked this door again, and again, desperately wishing she’d had John for backup.
Finally, with the third kick, on what felt like a sprained ankle, there was a splintering sound.
Adele felt a surge of exhilaration, coupled with dawning horror as she slammed her shoulder into the door and, with one final protesting crack, it gave way and swung inward.
She rushed into the room, sprinting over three neat sets of male shoes. She reached the kitchen table, her gun still raised, trained on the kitchen, then switching to the living room.
No one in sight.
She didn’t announce herself, but spun around the rectangular kitchen table and, breathing heavy, her shoulder and ankle pulsing with aches, she stared at the computer screen.
It was open to the Berlin PD website. Her father’s name and face filled the screen and her eyes flicked to the tabs of the browser: Google Maps was open. With a trembling hand, she lowered her gun, placing it on the table, and clicked the tab for the map.
A small red dot, like the laser on a sniper’s scope pulsed over a house in the suburbs.
She stared, scanning the map and her eyes flicking to the search bar.
It was her father’s address.
“Dear God,” she murmured, backing away from the table. Her hand fumbled in her pocket, but she finally managed to rip her phone from her pants and dial her father’s number. The cold blue screen blinked back a single word: Dad.
Once upon a time, she’d stored his name only as Joseph. But things had improved since then. At least, so she hoped.
Five rings. Six. Seven.
No answer.
She dialed again. Sometimes her dad ignored the phone, fearing telemarketers.
Another five. Six. Seven. Dial tone.
No answer.
A third try—still no answer.
Adele rammed her phone back into her pocket and she darted forward, one arm extended as she grabbed her gun; rapidly, she gave the house a cursory scan, one last time, then broke into a sprint, back out the rear door, hopping the splintered frame and racing back through the rose garden.
“John!” she shouted into her radio, “John—it’s Porter! Porter Schmidt is the killer. He’s going after the Sergea—my dad! John!”
She reached her car, swung open the door, and spilled into the seat, tossing her gun onto the passenger side. It took her three tries with trembling fingers to jam the key into the ignition and another couple of tries, with the engine groaning, for her to realize she still had the vehicle in neutral.
Cursing, Adele put the car in gear and tried to focus on breathing, to calm herself.
But the trick didn’t work this time.
Adrenaline met terror and did a number on her mind, sending her into a vortex of worry and fear. A physical clot of anxiety pulsed in her chest. Her dad. The killer was going after her dad.
She thought of her norther. Ribbons of red extending from the once beautiful woman, staining the clover leaves and blades of grass, spilling into the sodden ground in the park. A tapestry of swirling scars up and down her body.
“Fuck!” Adele shouted as she ripped from the curb and nearly hit a park bench. “Dammit!” She tore up the street, ignoring a vehicle half-pulled out of the driveway. The driver leaned on his horn in protest, but Adele ignored that too and floored the gas pedal, tearing through a stop sign and roaring up the street.
She’d just been at her father’s place. Had she missed him? Would she be too late?
No. No, she couldn’t think like that. She couldn’t be too late. Not this time. Please, God, not this time…
“John!” she repeated, slapping at the radio. “Where are you?”
A buzz, some static. Then, “Sharp? What is it?” Some of the joviality had faded from John’s voice. “Adele, are you okay?”
Tears were now streaming down her face. For a moment, Adele felt twenty again. Little more than a child, weeping at the news of her mother.
No. Not this time. Not her father too.
Still, she sobbed, trying to maintain professionalism, trying to suppress the emotions like she always did and always could. Emotions caused weakness. Emotions were distractions for an investigator.
But she couldn’t push back the kaleidoscope of horrible images now playing themselves across her brain, suggesting all the coulds and what-ifs of the immediate future. Each thought brought a new wave of emotion and a new surge of speed as Adele ripped through traffic, receiving more than one blare from a horn. At last, she remembered to flip on her lights and siren—the BKA had been kind enough to at least supply that.
Siren wailing now, blue and red flashing across the glinting windshield and hood of her car, she zipped beneath a red light, surging back onto the highway, heading in the direction of her father’s house.
“No,” she said. “John—John he’s going after my dad. It’s Porter. He’s going after my father!”
A pause. Then, a serious voice. “You’re sure?”
Her voice cracked. “ Yes, John, please—”
“Where does your father live?” he rattled off, his voice becoming colder, more calculated. The voice of a military man in the middle of a high-stakes operation.
Adele recited her father’s address from memory, her eyes glued to the road as she wove in and out of traffic.
There was a staticky buzz, then John, sounding out of breath now as if he were running, said, “I’m on my way. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“John, it’s my dad.”
“Damn it, Adele, I know.” The distant slamming sound of a car door interrupted through the static. “Just wait for me. Okay? Promise me you’ll wait.”
Adele didn’t reply. She gripped the steering wheel, no longer attempting to suppress her emotions, but stewing in them as she sped through the city, racing toward her father’s house and into the waiting arms of a killer.
CHAPTER THIRTY
She tore into the driveway, heralded by the yipping sound of the neighbor’s dogs. She flung open the car door, not bothering to close it, only pausing for a second as she remembered to grab her gun from the passenger’s seat.