A Deeper Fear (Lucy Kincaid #17.5) - Allison Brennan Page 0,4
Sean had hit bottom last month when she found him locked in a cage, beaten, bloodied. How much did he have to suffer before he was healed? It hurt not to be able to help him, to fix the problem.
Lucy looked over Jack’s shoulder when a familiar face entered. “Excuse me,” she said to her brother.
“Abandoning me?”
Lucy gestured to where Megan was watching them. “I think Megan wants you to rescue her.”
Jack looked over and grinned. “Should I?”
“Of course.”
Lucy left him and approached Nora, Duke’s wife and also an FBI agent in the Sacramento office. She looked like she didn’t want to be there, either. Lucy didn’t know her well, but when they had spent time together, Lucy appreciated Nora’s down-to-earth common sense.
Nora looked relieved when she saw Lucy. “I didn’t want to come, but Dean said I needed to show my face tonight. One hour is all I promised.” She looked over to where Dean and Megan had drawn a much larger crowd than when Lucy had left them. They were both extroverts and used to socializing; Lucy preferred the one-on-one conversations.
“Wine?” she asked Nora.
“God, yes.” They walked over to the cash bar and waited in the line. “I assume Megan told you about the party on Saturday.”
“She did.”
“I don’t generally like parties, but this one will be fun, and I haven’t seen their house since we helped them move in months ago. I know they’ve been doing a lot of work.”
“It looks great,” Lucy said. “The kitchen still needs updating, but Jack said they were going on vacation this summer and letting the contractors rip everything out.”
Nora laughed lightly. “Jack? Vacation? I don’t think he knows the meaning of the word.”
“That’s why Megan is good for him.”
They reached the front of the line. Nora ordered white, Lucy stuck with her preferred red, and they moved away from the crowd.
“How’s Molly?” Lucy asked. “I hope you’re bringing her on Saturday.”
“Of course, she’s the joy of my life,” Nora said. “I love my job, but I hate leaving her every day—though Duke is a terrific dad. He’s now working from home almost every day, and when he has to go downtown to RCK he takes her, or we have a terrific babysitter we can call. I can’t believe she’s already two years old.”
“JP—my nephew—will be two next month, and Carina had a little girl last week. Grace. Sean and I are going back to Texas by way of San Diego on Sunday so we can see her.”
“I don’t think a second baby is in the cards for me—but that’s okay. I didn’t even expect to have Molly, considering I was forty when I got pregnant.”
“I’ll bet Duke and Sean are having fun with her.”
Nora tilted her head. “Sean?”
“Sean said he was going over to your place. Maybe you missed him.”
“Duke is at Fort Bragg working on a security fix for one of their systems. He won’t be back until Friday. It was last-minute—they called this morning. I had our sitter come over for a couple of hours so I could show my face here. If I’d have known Sean wasn’t coming tonight, I totally would have tagged him to babysit.”
Lucy was speechless. Why would Sean lie to her? Or maybe he didn’t know . . .
He would have called Duke before he went over. He would have known Duke was out of town.
She didn’t say anything, and fortunately at that moment a colleague of Nora’s walked over and started talking to them.
Lucy couldn’t focus on the conversation. All she could think about was why Sean had lied to her and Jack about his plans tonight.
Chapter Two
Pride Tactical owned a state-of-the-art van that rivaled most law enforcement tactical vans. Ellen used it for demonstrations because she could also use it as a command center, of sorts. She had permission to park outside the convention center for the duration of the law enforcement conference. It looked official, though there was nothing that screamed police on the outside. It was black and sleek with the Pride logo discreetly painted on the doors.
She finished checking the drone—twice—and did a trial run without the camera to make sure everything worked before Marc knocked on the rear door.
She opened up the back. “When I said nine, I meant nine.”
“I texted you that I would be late.”
“A few minutes, you said. It’s well after.”
She knew she sounded nasty; what she’d told Jack earlier was mostly true. She and Marc did get along better now than they had