Stranded With The Suspect

He glared at her. “He didn’t have any problem hurting you.”

She flinched at the anger in his voice. “He’s terrified. He’s never been in a situation like this before,” she said. “I’m sure when he calms down he’ll cooperate.”

“Save your breath,” Simon said. “No matter how much you want to believe it, Daniel Metwater isn’t the saint he’s been pretending to be. My guess is this isn’t his first run-in with the law.”

Was Simon right? How much did she know about the Prophet, really? But he had always been so gentle and kind to her. She couldn’t make the crazed, angry man who had confronted her tonight fit with her previous experience with him. “What are you doing?” she asked as Simon set the backpack on the floor at the end of the sofa.

“I’m staying here tonight.”

“You can’t do that.”

“I can and I will.”

“I don’t want you here,” she protested.

“Maybe not, but you need me.”

She swallowed down the fear his words kindled in her. “He left,” she said. “He won’t come back.”

“You don’t really believe that, do you?” He sat on the sofa, only a few inches from her feet. “He won’t give up that easily, and when he returns, you’ll be glad I’m here. What did he say to you while he was here?”

“He wanted my help to get out of here. He planned to dress up in some of my clothes and pretend to be my sister.”

“Did you refuse to help him? Is that what set him off?”

She put a hand to her cheek, remembering the sting of the slap. “I asked him about Michelle and Hunter. I asked if it was true that he tried to hurt them. He became very angry and slapped me. Why would he do that? He’s never done anything like that before.”

“He knows we’re closing in on him,” Simon said. “I think he’s trying to destroy everyone who could provide evidence against him.”

“But what do I know that could possibly hurt him?” she asked.

Simon regarded her coolly. “You’ve lived with him how long now? About six months?”

“Five.”

“You’re closer to him than anyone else.”

They were the same words Michelle had used. But they weren’t true. “He isn’t really close to anyone.”

Simon angled toward her, one arm along the back of the sofa. Weariness pulled at his eyes, and the dark shadow of beard showed along his jaw. If he had driven from Montrose this morning, that meant he had been up for hours. “Help me understand,” he said. “What is it about Metwater that attracted you? Why leave everything to live in the middle of nowhere with him? Seems to me you had it pretty good before you hooked up with him.”

“That’s because people like you think money solves everything,” she said. “My life was shallow and meaningless before I met the Prophet and heard him talk about what really matters.”

“And what is that?” he asked.

“Living in community. Being close to nature. Focusing on things of real worth, not merely those of monetary value.”

She braced herself, prepared for him to mock her, but he only nodded his head thoughtfully. “Those things are certainly important,” he said. “The problem with Metwater’s approach is that his idea of community is to live apart and isolated. He didn’t contribute to society, he only took from it. He liked to pass himself off as a giver, but really, he’s just a user. He used you.”

She hugged her arms across her chest and glared at him. “You’re one to talk,” she said. “You don’t care about me. You only want evidence for your case.”

His expression hardened. “You’re right. I want to build a case that will put Daniel Metwater away for years. He’s the worst kind of criminal—he pretends to care about people, then he takes advantage of the most vulnerable.”

“You’re wrong! You haven’t seen how he’s helped so many people. He’s helped addicts quit drugs and ex-convicts go straight.”

“Yeah? At what price? He takes everything they have and makes them believe they need him to survive.”

“Maybe they do,” she said. “Not everyone is capable of living in normal society.”

“Then that’s sadder still,” he said.

She turned away from him, not wanting him to read the confusion and hurt in her eyes. She wasn’t an idiot. She recognized that some of what he said was true. But why couldn’t he see that the good Daniel had done outweighed the bad? Yes, he had struck her, but that was only one more sign of how afraid and desperate he was. She couldn’t wrap her mind around the idea that he was a violent man.

Simon stood. “Try to get some sleep,” he said. “Tomorrow, we’re headed back to Montrose.”

“You can go,” she said. “I’m staying here.”

“You don’t have a say in the matter,” Simon said. “As of now, you’re officially in protective custody.”

Chapter Four (#u275ac6f8-0169-5a07-8448-3e990ece577f)

Simon shifted on the hotel suite sofa, unable to get comfortable. Not that he was expecting to sleep—he had his gun on the coffee table within easy reach, ready in case Daniel Metwater returned. Though the local police and hotel security were looking for the Prophet, Simon didn’t have confidence that they would find him. The two patrolmen who had responded to the hotel security call earlier had treated the incident as a domestic dispute between a woman and her boyfriend. They hadn’t taken Simon’s assertion that Daniel Metwater was a dangerous fugitive seriously.

But Simon knew better. Now that Michelle Munson—Starfall—and her child were out of his reach in a safe house elsewhere in the state, Metwater was focused on Andi Matheson. He only had to get hold of her and keep her alive two more days, until her twenty-fifth birthday, and he would have everything he wanted—her money and her permanent silence after he killed her.

Simon had stretched the truth a little when he told Andi she was in protective custody. He couldn’t force her to accept his protection, but it was the only way he could think of to make sure she was safe.

She refused to see the danger. Even after he had struck her, she still thought of Daniel Metwater as a prophet who only wanted to do good. Metwater had spent a lot of money cultivating that image, but Simon knew scum when he saw it. His line of work put him on a first-name basis with the worst of the worst—coyotes who took every dime a poor laborer ever made, then abandoned him and his family to die in the desert far from home. Men who promised to protect a young girl and find her a good job across the border, only to sell her into slavery in an illegal brothel in the city. Metwater was no better than those kind of abusers. He had managed to make Andi believe the best she deserved from him was to be one of many women he slept with, privileged to work as his unpaid secretary and be at his beck and call.

Maybe the other men in her life—her father and the man who was the father of her unborn child—had made her think she didn’t deserve to be treated better. They were both dead now, and as far as Simon could determine, no great loss there.

If he had a woman like Andi in his life, he would treat her with the care she deserved. He would make her his partner, not his servant, and protect her with his own life, if necessary.

Not that he’d ever have anyone like Andi. She was used to men with money and power and sophistication. Simon had none of those things. He was a hard man who spent his life doing hard, sometimes ugly things. Somebody had to do the things he did, but Andi deserved better. She deserved someone as good as she was.

He sighed and closed his eyes once more, willing himself to rest. He had done everything he knew to protect her. He had done what he could to make it tougher for Metwater to get to Andi.

But not impossible. That small room for doubt was what made every cop’s job a walk along a razor’s edge. There was always some aspect of the situation he couldn’t see, some action he couldn’t plan for.

The phone at his belt vibrated. He withdrew it and frowned at the unfamiliar number. “Hello?” he answered, speaking softly so as not to wake Andi in the next room.

“Officer Woolridge? This is Owen Pogue—one of the security guards here at the hotel.”

Simon sat up. “Yes? What is it?”

“This might not be connected to the man you’re looking for, but one of the housekeeping staff was assaulted on the third floor about half an hour ago. Whoever did it came up behind her, threw a blanket over her and shoved her into one of the supply closets. He didn’t really hurt her, but he took her keys.”

Simon was on his feet, headed for the door. “Did she get a look at the man?”