I remembered Angela's reaction when she first mentioned Howard, and I thought she meant he was a suspect. She'd hesitated before laughing it off and correcting me. And I thought she'd just been surprised, but then I began to wonder. Which is why I'd wanted to talk to her tonight. I'd hoped I was wrong. I liked Howard. Maybe I'm a romantic at heart, but I also liked the idea that he'd still cared enough about his ex to single-mindedly hunt down her killer. And then doubt had set in as I'd twisted the situation around. What if Howard killed Mindy? What better way to ensure he wasn't caught than to investigate her murder as the grieving ex?
I'd known exactly why he brought me to this shack, and I'd been relatively certain this place never belonged to Angela. It was just a convenient place to stash her . . . and now me.
I continued on to the house. Then I turned around, faced him and reached for my gun.
"Are you crazy?" he said, pointing his weapon at my forehead. "Or do you really think I didn't realize you'd taken the bullets out of my gun?"
He turned the barrel aside and fired.
Oh, shit . . .
When I'd seen him on the floor of Angela's office, I'd emptied his gun before I roused him. That's why I hadn't been too worried about him holding me at gunpoint . . . until now.
Howard prodded me to the shack, opened the door and shoved me into a dimly lit room. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust. Then I saw Angela. Bound, gagged and furious, her eyes blazing.
I started toward her.
Howard shook his head and waved the gun. "A little more distance between the ladies, please."
I glanced around. It was a one-room shack with a single door and windows. Not even an indoor bathroom. The only furnishings were a couple of lawn chairs, one broken, the other rotted.
"Put your hands out," Howard said.
I did. He stuffed the gun into his holster, eyeing me the whole time, waiting for any sign of attack. I stood patiently, hands extended as he wrapped thin nylon rope around my wrists. Only when he had my hands secured did he relax. And I kicked him in the kneecap as hard as I could.
He flailed, hands windmilling to find his balance. I managed to snag the grip of his gun with my bound hands, but I didn't get a good enough hold to pull it out before he recovered. His first reaction was to grab his gun, which I was still holding, albeit awkwardly. That meant that we pulled it out together. Then I let go and slammed my bound hands up into his.
He fumbled the gun. As it fell, he went for it, but Angela was right there, and maybe she couldn't do a whole lot, being bound and gagged, but she was on the floor, which meant when she slammed into his legs, he tumbled overtop her.
Angela kicked the gun aside. Howard scrabbled up and went for it again, but now I rammed into him with my shoulder, hard enough that pain ripped through it. I hit him again, this time a head butt that sent him staggering back. I was about to strike again when the door flew open and Jack swung in, gun raised.
"Stop," Jack said.
Howard twisted to look over at him. He eyed the gun. Eyed Jack . . . and then lifted his hands over his head.
Chapter Twenty-six
Jack
Jack followed Nadia out of the cabin. Inside, Howard had taken Angela's place, bound and gagged on the floor. Angela wanted to speak to Howard alone, in hopes of negotiating a way to turn him into the police without involving Jack. So after they made sure Howard was secure, Jack and Nadia went outside.
"Well," Nadia said once they were away from the cabin. "At least I had the foresight to empty his gun."
"You didn't think he'd notice?"
"Hey, the guy was nearly blown to smithereens and never even raised his weapon. I hoped that meant he'd fail to notice his weapon seemed a whole lot lighter. It was worth a shot. I still sent you that text as a backup plan, though. I guess Felix's GPS app in my phone worked, huh?"
Jack hesitated. Shit. Right. Felix had installed an app in each of their work phones, which was supposed to let them track each other in an emergency. Felix had warned it might not work well, so Jack had forgotten all about it.
The truth was that he'd played a hunch that Nadia might go to Angela's office--which was in the direction the taxi had been heading--so he'd hot-wired a car and arrived just in time to see Nadia leaving with Howard. He'd relaxed . . . until he'd gotten her text. He'd followed Howard's car and then . . . Well, the problem with jacking a nice ride is that it might have an ignition kill. The owner had realized that his--or her--car was gone and shut it down. Jack had set off running, and fortunately, within a mile, he'd spotted Howard's car.
He nodded. "Yeah, GPS worked fine. Didn't matter. You had it under control."
"I appreciated the save, though. Nice work."
Jack was about to answer when Angela came out of the cabin.
"Okay, negotiations complete," she said. "I'll tell the police that I came along willingly, which saves Howard from the kidnapping charge. In return, he won't mention either of you. I followed him here, hoping to get him to confess to the murders. We fought. I won."