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  Van would have gotten a kick out of the whole thing. She looked up at the sky and grinned, missing him so acutely it felt as if someone had carved out a piece of her heart.

  Her work cell rang. She checked caller ID and pulled a surprised face. “What can I do for you, SSA Sheridan?”

  She hadn’t expected to hear from him again after their exchange at the funeral yesterday.

  “Can you meet me at Van’s house in the next hour?”

  Her heart gave a hard whump. Had he found something?

  “Agent Kanas? Are you still there?”

  “Yeah. Yes. Sorry.” She looked at the strewn motor vehicles and the mile-long line of traffic with drivers all craning their necks to see what had gone down. She had some paperwork to write up and a report to make, but… “I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

  She hung up because she didn’t like the way she responded to SSA Sheridan’s voice. A lot of men had sexy voices. Didn’t mean anything, even though it was packaged well. She climbed into her car, knowing she’d ache tomorrow but for now, she was still riding the adrenaline high. She’d helped get another bad guy off the street, and that was why she’d joined the FBI in the first place. And why she stayed.

  Chapter Five

  As Ava drove up to Van’s house, a feeling of immense sorrow sank into her bones. It didn’t look like Sheridan was here yet and she was glad. It gave her a moment to grieve in peace. It was an older neighborhood, a lot of small family homes built in the fifties and sixties with some newer, larger homes here and there.

  She stepped out of the Impala and headed slowly across the street to the neat little bungalow Van had shared with the wife he’d worshipped. The air was still warm from the heat of the day and the scent of roses from Jessica’s garden scented the air. Jessica had passed away by the time Ava had worked with him, but every room reflected the woman who’d made this house a home. As far as Ava knew, Van hadn’t altered a thing.

  When her father had been murdered, Ava and her younger brother and sister had been packed up with barely the clothes on their backs and whisked clear across the country. The only reminder of her father had been a framed photograph kept in her mother’s bedroom. That, and Ava’s recurring nightmares.

  Ava missed her dad even though she could barely remember him now.

  The smell of fresh cut grass snapped her out of her memories. The sound of someone approaching from around the side of the house made her tense.

  Supervisory Special Agent Dominic Sheridan appeared wearing dark slacks, a bright white shirt—complete with his service weapon in a shoulder holster—and expensive-looking, black leather shoes, now covered in grass shavings. His tie was gone, sleeves rolled, revealing tanned, strong-looking forearms and nicely shaped hands.

  He stopped short and looked momentarily nonplussed. Cleared his throat. “Van didn’t like the grass getting too long.”

  They looked away from one another. Their individual grief too raw to share.

  “My jacket’s around back.” He tilted his head toward the rear of the house in a walk-with-me motion.

  Ava said nothing as she followed him. Van lived in a corner plot with a big wedge-shaped yard. Sheridan’s Prius Bucar was pulled up outside Van’s garage. Sheridan’s jacket hung off a fence post, a red tie sticking out of the pocket. Ava watched as he rolled down his sleeves and buttoned the cuffs, the muscles in his arms flexing. Her cheeks heated. Hopefully he hadn’t noticed her ogling him and he’d blame the blush on the sun. He shrugged into his jacket but left his tie in the pocket.

  “What can I do for you, SSA Sheridan?”

  Those deep blue eyes probed her face. “Call me Dominic.”

  “Okay.” She made it sound like a question, feigning a nonchalance she wasn’t feeling. His face was attractive. His voice was attractive. So was his stupid name. He oozed power and confidence, wealth and charm. If she had any smarts at all she’d stick to calling him SSA Sheridan.

  When she didn’t say anything further, he pulled a key from his pocket. Ava crossed her arms. “You want to go inside?”

  He nodded.

  A shiver of trepidation hit her. “Did you look at the reports?”

  His lips thinned. “I decided to take a look at the house first.”

  “Do yourself a favor. Don’t look at the autopsy photos.”

  “Did you?” Those denim eyes were intent on hers. She didn’t want to show weakness in front of a superior but this was about the loss of a friend. A good friend. For both of them.

  “I wish I hadn’t.” She admitted as she turned toward the house.

  “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Ava met his gaze then. “Aldrich won’t be happy that I’m here.”

  “My boss won’t either, but I hadn’t planned on telling him.”

  “Good plan.” They shared a quick smile.

  In silent agreement they approached via the back door, the one Van insisted friends and family use when they came by.

  “When was the last time you were here?” he asked.

  “Monday last week.” She hadn’t wanted Van to get lonely—at least that’s what she’d told herself. In truth she was the one who was lonely but she wasn’t about to welcome SSA Sheridan to her pity party. “What about you?”

  He grimaced. “May. I had a busy few months.”

  Ava could tell he regretted that now. She stood aside and allowed him to turn the key and swing the door wide.

  She went to take a step forward, but he touched her arm. “Put these on.”

  He held out a pair of latex gloves and then pulled paper booties out of his pocket. She eyed them with surprise. “You think this is a crime scene?”

  “Isn’t that what you’ve been trying to convince people?”

  “But no one is buying it.” She took the gloves and tugged them on. “You said you didn’t read the reports, so—”

  “I started to,” he admitted. He stretched the latex over his fingers with a snap. “It felt like I was reading about a stranger. I figured I’d get a better sense if I first looked at the scene myself.”

  They both slipped the paper covers over their shoes. A ball of dread congealed in her stomach. “Has anyone else been in here since…?”

  Sheridan shook his head. “Van’s daughters were waiting until after the funeral to deal with the house.”

  She squared her shoulders and stepped inside. A wave of memories pummeled her. Van standing next to the coffeepot. Van making scrambled eggs for dinner because it was one of the few things he knew how to cook and he was always happy to share.

  Sheridan’s mouth was downturned as if cataloguing his own memories of happier times. “Why did you come over last Monday?”

  It felt like a lifetime ago now. “I’d made an arrest on a child pornography investigation that started when he was in the office. He liked to know the status of things. When I was able to tell him anything, I mean.” Once retired, former agents were no longer privy to information on active cases but she’d sometimes bent the rules a little if she’d thought Van might be able to offer insight.

  “Child porn cases are the worst.”

  They exchanged a look. That kind of case was so common that almost every law enforcement officer dealt with one at some point. Many agents working them long-term required therapy afterward. One of the most effective therapies Ava had found was taking those monsters off the street.

  An odor stirred in the stale air. Unidentifiable to most people, but not to law enforcement. It became ingrained on the palate like salt or pepper. Sheridan led the way down a short corridor that opened out onto a large, open-plan, living room off to the left and a half bath and then an office off to the right.

  A black feeling pressed down between her shoulder blades. What if she was wrong about her theory? What if she was making Dominic Sheridan suffer this ordeal simply because she was reluctant to accept Van had decided to end it all? People killed themselves all the damn time, though she could never understand why. Hopefully she
never would.

  What if she was right? Sheridan was the only person who’d even pretended to believe her.

  He paused with his fingers on the doorknob. “Ready?”

  “Nope.” She braced herself. “Let’s do this anyway.”

  He opened the office door and flicked on the light switch. They both stood for moment, feet made of matching lumps of clay. The fetor of death hit the back of her throat, and she wanted to gag. Somehow, she forced the impulse away. Blood and brain matter were sprayed against the wall behind the desk, blackened with age.

  As ghastly as this was, it was still Van, a man who’d been like a father to her. When it came to father figures, apparently, she was bad luck. She touched the beads on her wrist.

  “This sucks.” Sheridan took a step into the room and skirted the edge, careful not to touch anything. She liked that he didn’t pretend to be unaffected. Anyone unaffected by a scene like this when the victim had been a dear friend couldn’t be anything other than a sociopath or an asshole, and she generally avoided both.

  Ava followed without a word. Someone had turned off the air conditioning. The fusty air combined with the biological decomposition made the stench unbearable. Iciness rushed over her, and her stomach started to churn. She strode over to open first the blinds and then the window, the outside air blowing over her face, immediately helping her breathe. The scent of freshly cut grass wafted inside and made her smile even as tears pricked the back of her eyes. Van would have appreciated Sheridan cutting his lawn even if, right now, the smell made her want to retch.

  “The window was open the night he died,” she recalled, swallowing repeatedly, desperate to moisten her throat.

  A screen of shrubs covered most of the view.

  She didn’t know why she was suddenly shivering when the house was so stuffy and hot.

  Dominic came over and stood beside her, the heat of his body warming the air between them. There was a key in the other window which was locked. He touched it with his index finger.

  “No screen?”

  Ava shook her head. “I don’t know if there was ever one here.”

  “I’ll check with Sarah. She’ll know.”

  Van’s daughters lived in Baltimore where they’d both gone to college. Ava had met them briefly a few times when they’d visited, although she’d tried not to intrude on family time.

  Sheridan walked around to the far side of the desk. Blood and gore coated the back of the hard, wooden swivel chair Van had insisted on using. Drips of something stained the carpet beneath.

  Ava averted her eyes. This was harder than she’d expected. “They took whatever he was drinking that night, the glass, his weapon to the lab.”

  Sheridan nodded. “Makes sense.”

  Nothing else did. No note. No hints of depression. No warning.

  “Who found him?” he asked.

  “A neighbor called it in Wednesday morning.”

  “You talk to him?”

  She shook her head. Everything had been such a whirlwind of grief and denial, followed by anger and frustration leading up to the funeral she hadn’t even thought of it.

  “Wanna do it now?” he asked.

  She’d rather get her stomach pumped. “Sure.”

  * * *

  As much as he wanted to sprint out of Van’s study, a death scene now ingrained on his brain more effectively than any photograph, Dominic carefully closed and locked the window before leaving. It wasn’t like Van to be lax on security, but maybe that had changed after Jessica’s death and his subsequent retirement. Maybe he’d stopped caring. Dominic hadn’t come around often enough to know for sure, and the gnawing feeling of guilt kept running its sharp teeth over his flesh. As far as friends went, Dominic was bottom of the heap. Unlike the agent he followed down the hallway.

  It made him feel ashamed. It also meant he wanted to help Ava Kanas find answers to any loose ends, to gain closure.

  They strode through the kitchen where Van had spent so much time drinking coffee and reading the newspapers. Van had claimed he got more in-depth information scouring newsprint headlines than reading online articles. Dominic rarely had time to read the papers anymore, which was another reminder that he shouldn’t even be here. He should be finalizing the timetable for the negotiator courses CNU ran four times a year and checking in with various sieges throughout the country and overseas. But someone had taken a shot at them yesterday and, like Agent Kanas, he couldn’t ignore the possibility it was somehow related to Van’s death. The task force was working all angles, but he’d known this man intimately and so had Kanas. If there was truly something “hinky” about Van’s demise, they’d figure it out faster than anyone else.

  They stood for a moment on the back porch inhaling lungfuls of clean air trying to eliminate the pervasive odor of death that clung stubbornly to anything it came into contact with. This was so much worse than being at some random crime scene. This was someone he’d loved. Someone they’d both loved and respected.

  No way should Van’s family have to deal with that. He’d talk to the company that cleaned his home and see if they could recommend a professional cleaning service. He wouldn’t ask permission to get this place sanitized. It’s what Van would want.

  Van’s house stood at the end of a row, but there were properties to the front and the rear. “Which neighbor?” he asked gruffly.

  Ava met his gaze, and he caught a glimpse of the devastation he’d been feeling all week reflected in her hazel eyes. She jerked her chin to their right. “Couple with the poodle next door.”

  Dominic had first met them when Jessica had become sick. More than neighbors. Friends. Reluctantly he led the way.

  He checked his watch. His boss had gone up to HQ today to discuss budget needs, and he’d be there again tomorrow. Savage was staying in Dominic’s DC apartment. It was nicer than a hotel and Dominic liked it to be occupied whenever possible by people he trusted.

  It was the same thing every year, negotiators desperately begging for more funding while HRT and SWAT seemed to just breathe a request, and it was miraculously filled.

  It was true that sometimes talk couldn’t beat bullets. Sometimes the hostage-taker was determined to kill their captives. Sometimes they were narcissistic assholes who couldn’t be reasoned with. But often negotiators could work magic simply by slowing things down and listening.

  Waco was arguably the Bureau’s biggest failure and had sullied the organization’s reputation for more than a decade. If the negotiators had been left to do things their way, the slow trickle of people leaving the compound might have become a rush and eventually David Koresh could conceivably have been left with no one to lead but his own inflated ego. More than eighty people might not have died in the conflagration. Kids might have survived into adulthood.

  And maybe that was wishful thinking on the negotiators’ part.

  Dominic knew some of the agents involved were still haunted by what had happened on that day in April so long ago, by the mistakes the FBI had made. None of them wanted a repeat of that fiasco.

  He held the gate for Agent Kanas. She looked like a leggy teen today, dressed down in tight jeans and a soft t-shirt that outlined her breasts in a way that warned him to keep his gaze north. She walked ahead and his attention drifted to her ass. He mentally kicked himself and pinned his eyes back to her long hair that was once again tied up in a messy bun.

  What was he thinking? He did not get involved with other agents. Not even for steamy one-nighters. The potential for complications was too great, and he was careful to keep his job and his sex life in strictly different lanes.

  Not that Kanas was offering.

  At the neighbor’s back gate, she stopped and put her hands on her hips. “You want me to take the lead?”

  The neighbors’ house was a large, new bungalow with small windows. “It might be better for your career if I do it.”

  She shrugged one shoulder. He noticed a bruise on her forearm and wondered how she got it—sp
arring? Arresting a suspect? Rough sex?

  She flashed him a quick grin, and it transformed her face. It was the first time he’d really noticed her smile, and it softened her features and made her eyes glow with mischief. “If anyone asks, I’ll say you ordered me to do it.”

  He huffed out a laugh. He’d seen how well she took orders when she’d been interacting with her boss. “Let’s hope no one asks.”

  He didn’t mind taking responsibility for today’s “investigation,” but he hoped it wouldn’t come to that. He’d survive the flak better than she would if they were discovered. As long as they kept their questioning discreet, they should be fine.

  She knocked firmly on the door, and they both stood to one side of the doorframe, even though he wasn’t expecting trouble.

  A dog barked and scratched at the other side of the door.

  “Who is it?” The voice was muffled behind the thick wood.

  Dominic nodded to Ava.

  “This is FBI Agent Ava Kanas. I’m here with Supervisory Special Agent Sheridan, Mr. Gabany. We were hoping to talk to you about Van.”

  Dominic wasn’t surprised Ava remembered the neighbor’s name. Van didn’t waste his time with new agents unless he thought they had potential and that was regardless of whether or not they had pretty faces. Something about the way Kanas had conducted herself since the shooting hinted at a keen intelligence and innate competence. Sure, she was pushy and lacked tact, but there was an honesty and integrity about her that would have appealed to his old friend.

  It appealed to him.

  The lock turned, and the door cracked open an inch. After a moment of cautious assessment, the man’s eyes grew large, and he opened the door wide. A poodle Dominic had met on several occasions scrambled out to inspect them.

  “Sorry, Dominic, I didn’t recognize the name. After the shooting yesterday, the wife and I are both a bit jumpy. Did you catch the shooter?”

  Dominic reached down to pet the soft curls on the dog’s head. “We’re still working on it. How’s your wife holding up?”