Cut and Run (Lucy Kincaid #16) - Allison Brennan Page 0,55
and there were security cameras all over the place.
The officer wrote everything down.
Sean was supposed to protect them. But clearly, someone had tipped off the shooter. Who? Someone who worked in the courthouse? Someone Stan reached out to in the hours he was waiting for release?
The van was there when you arrived ten minutes ago. They were waiting. How long?
“Marie,” Sean said as the ambulance pulled up behind Sean’s car.
“Stan. I need to go with him to the hospital.”
“They’re working on him right now. He’s alive, that’s all I know. Marie, listen to me. This is important. Did Stan talk to anyone while you were waiting for his bail and ankle monitor?”
“I … yes … but—”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. He used my phone.”
“May I take it? Someone knew when you were leaving.”
The officer said, “I don’t know about that—”
Marie ignored him and handed Sean her phone. “The passcode is four-four-two-one.”
“You go with Stan. I’ll meet you at the hospital.”
He helped her stand, inspected her head. “You have a bump, you should be looked at for a possible concussion.”
Spontaneously she hugged him, tears beginning to flow. “You saved my life. You risked everything for me, I’ll never forget that. My boys—” She choked up. “My boys.” That was all she needed to say.
“Don’t leave the hospital until we talk. You shouldn’t go anywhere alone until we figure out what’s going on. But I think Stan was the primary target.” But the shooter didn’t care if they hit anyone else. And if the shooter thought Stan might have said something to Marie, she could also be in danger.
So could Max.
The shooter was good. Of the five shots, three hit Stan, one grazed Sean, and one missed completely. Sean hadn’t clearly seen the weapon, but it looked and sounded like a small-arms semi-automatic pistol. Well-trained, possible former military.
Sean knew professional bodyguards he trusted, at least until they could rule out Marie as a target.
He watched as the ambulance left, gave his statement again to the investigators, then called a tow company to pick up his jeep.
While waiting for a private taxi to take him to pick up a rental car, he looked at Marie’s phone.
Stan had called two people, neither of whom was in Marie’s contact list. As the ambulance rushed Stan off to the hospital, Sean searched the owners of those numbers on his own phone.
The first was to Mitch Corta, Stan’s partner.
The second was to an unregistered number, likely a burner phone. Virtually impossible to trace.
Did one of those people set up the assassination attempt? Or was it his new lawyer, Oliver Jones?
Or someone in the courthouse?
Sean had his work cut out for him. He called Max. She was going to have to watch her back, because if the shooter believed Stan had told her something that might be dangerous to them, Max could be at risk, too.
But in his gut, he suspected Stanley Grant was going to take his secrets to his grave, and that the only way he and Max would be able to find out who shot Stan was to solve Victoria Mills’s murder.
Chapter Fourteen
Max had been trying to meet with Detective Jennifer Reed for the last two hours. She talked to the PIO, who was friendly but gave her absolutely nothing about the Victoria Mills homicide that Max hadn’t already obtained through the PIO’s official statement. But when Sean called her about the shooting at the courthouse only minutes after it happened, Max knew exactly what Reed would be doing.
Max left the police station and walked around to the side exit, where there was no public parking but no guard to stop her, either. She’d researched the senior detective before she left New York, had her official photo to go by—medium height, short straight black hair, brown skin, brown eyes. She had a decent record in the department but no major standout cases and volunteered during her off time at a youth center run by a church. Cops notoriously avoided social media, but once she had her name and photo Max was able to dig up a few things about her.
Within ten minutes of Max staking out her spot—not caring much if one of the many cameras caught her waiting—Detective Reed exited with a male cop substantially younger than she.
Reed saw her and swore out loud. She said something to the young detective, then turned to Max.
“You’re trespassing.”
“The sign says no public parking, not no public allowed,” Max said. “Two minutes.”