Dead Certain - Mariah Stewart [112]
“No.” Evan and Sean both shook their heads simultaneously. “No.”
“Sorry, guys.” Anne Marie looked from Evan to Sean, then back again. “If you want him, you’re going to have to put out the only bait that has a chance to draw him in.”
“No. You are not going to use Amanda. I won’t have it,” Sean said. “We’ll have to come up with something else.”
“I’m with him,” Evan told her.
“Then accept the fact that you will not get him. It’s as simple as that.” Anne Marie stood up. “When you decide you want him badly enough, you’ll know what to do.”
Sean rose to answer a sharp rap on the door. He opened it to find a tall, leggy woman with a mane of black hair that spread over her shoulders and ice blue eyes set in a gorgeous face.
“Sean Mercer?” She flashed white teeth. “I’m Miranda Cahill. Annie invited me to your party.”
Anne Marie grinned. “Sean, I mentioned Special Agent Cahill earlier. She and Vince Giordano are acquainted.”
“Livia Bach and I were in the neighborhood,” Miranda explained as she took a seat across from Sean. “We flipped a coin to see who went where. Livvy won the toss so she’s been sent to guard-dog your witness.” She flashed a megawatt smile. “You lucky blokes got me. Good to see you again, Evan.”
Annie tossed the photos from Connie Paschall’s funeral onto the table. “See anyone you know?” she asked Miranda.
Miranda flipped through the stack. “Ha! My main man, Vince G.” She shook her head slowly as she studied the pictures. “What happened to those fiery red locks of yours, Vince? And those glasses, my, my. But even those new tortoiseshell frames can’t hide those cold dead eyes. . . .”
She looked through the other photos of Derek, Marian, and Connie.
“This all his work?” Miranda folded the photos together, as neatly as a deck of cards.
Sean nodded. “We believe it is.”
“All right, then.” She handed the stack to Sean. “What’s the plan?”
Anne Marie brought Miranda up to date on the theories that had been tossed around and the discussion they’d been having on where to go from here.
“Strangers on a Train, eh?” Miranda sat back in her chair and ran the concept through her mind. “I can see that. And actually, it’s the only thing that makes any sense. It would explain why Channing went after the judge and Vince’s mother-in-law, why he was trying so hard to get to Mara. And then we have Vince going after people who had pissed off Lowell. So do we have three players, not two? Channing, Giordano, and Lowell?”
“It looks that way, doesn’t it? But we haven’t been able to figure out when and where they would have been alone together to have worked this out,” Sean pointed out.
“Maybe we never will. I think the important thing right now is getting our hands on Vince.” Miranda glanced at Evan. “Before he gets his hands on your sister. And guys, I hate to say it, but Annie is right on. The only way you are going to get this creep to crawl out from the rock he’s hiding under is if he thinks he’s going to get Amanda.”
“I don’t like this.” Sean shook his head. “I don’t like the idea of putting Amanda in harm’s way.”
Miranda studied his face, knew there was more there than a cop being worried about a potential victim.
She put her hand on Sean’s arm. “We can do this in a way that appears that we’re putting her out there, but of course she won’t be alone for a minute.”
“Won’t he figure that out?” Evan asked the obvious.
“Not if we do this right,” she told him.
“Maybe Amanda should be part of this conversation, then,” Sean suggested. “If we’re going to be using her as bait, she should at least have a say in this.”
“I agree. Can we get her over here?” Anne Marie asked.
“I am not happy about this,” Evan muttered.
“Neither am I.” Sean’s fingers played with a corner of the folder. “But I have to reluctantly agree with Anne Marie and Miranda. Unless we can come up with another way to get him to come to us, I don’t think we have a choice. We’re either going