Before He Hunts (A Mackenzie White Mystery—Book 8)

CHAPTER ONE The plane was taking her to Nebraska. Mackenzie blinked, unable to shake the thought from her mind. She usually had no problem falling asleep on a plane. But this flight was different. She felt like there was something out west that was literally pulling the plane toward it like a magnet. And she would not be returning to Washington, DC, until she had solved a current case that reached nearly twenty years into her past—pointing at the death of her father. It was a case that had been calling her for years. She’d gone above and beyond to prove herself, and McGrath was finally setting her loose on this case. It was no longer just about the unsolved murder of her father seventeen years ago; similar murders were occurring now, all connected by a mysterious clue that no one had yet deciphered. Business cards featuring the nonexistent business name of Barker Antiques. Mackenzie thought about those business cards as she looked out the window. The afternoon sky was clear. Beyond the scattering of plump white clouds, she could just barely catch sight of the vein-like structure of roadways that carved through the Midwest down below. Nebraska was close now, its cornfields and flat expanses looming about forty-five minutes ahead. “You okay?” She blinked and looked away from the window, turning to her right. Ellington sat in the seat next to her. She knew he was nervous, too. He knew how much this case meant to her and was putting unnecessary pressure on himself. Even now, he was nervously picking at the lid of the cup that had held ginger ale ten minutes ago. “Yeah, I’m good,” she said. “If I’m being honest, I can’t wait to get started.” “You got a plan in mind?” he asked. “I do,” she said. As she wound her way through her plan of attack, she realized that this was one of the reasons she had fallen in love with him. He could tell that she needed to talk through it all but would shut down if he asked her point-blank. So instead of asking about her emotional state, he used the façade of work to pry. She was on to his tricks, but that was okay. He knew how to work around her defenses in a way that was charming and caring. So she discussed her plan of attack. It all started by meeting with the local PD and the small team of FBI agents that had been working the case. She also planned to bring Kirk Peterson, the private detective who had worked the case for a while, in on it. Although he had been in a miserable state the last time she had seen him, he had the most insight to offer. From there, she wanted to find and speak with a man named Dennis Parks. His fingerprints had been found on Gabriel Hambry, a man who had been strategically set up as a red herring a week ago. She was well aware that Parks could also be another red herring, but the fact that Dennis Parks had once known her father made it all the more appealing. The connection was a small one—a mutual acquaintance as Parks had served as a police officer for one year before calling it quits and getting into real estate. Her father, after all, seemed to be the first victim in a string of seemingly random murders that had been spread over nearly two decades. After meeting with Dennis Parks, she wanted to meet with the family of a man who had been killed several months ago—a man named Jimmy Scotts. Scotts had died in an almost identical fashion as her father and had been the murder that had effectively reopened her father’s case. She stopped her plans there although she knew there was more to it. But it was something she was not ready to contend with yet—much less verbalize in front of Ellington. At some point, she was going to have to face her past. She’d been there before, tiptoeing through the house where she grew up. But it had been fleeting. At the time she had not realized it, but it had terrified her. It was like willingly walking into a house you knew to be haunted, locking yourself inside, and then throwing away the key. She’d have to face it this time around. It was hard enough to admit that to herself without wondering what Ellington would think of it. He nodded in all the right parts as she carried him through her step-by-step approach. They’d briefly discussed their roles in a meeting with McGrath as they had booked the trip to Nebraska. One element to the seemingly multilayered case was the recent murder of vagrants. The body count was now up to four, each body left with one of the Barker Antiques business cards. Ellington had volunteered to do his best to get that end of the case in order while Mackenzie stayed closer to the core of the case—the deaths of her father and Jimmy Scotts, and the more recent death of Gabriel Hambry. “You know,” Ellington said when she was done, “if we can wrap this one up, I think your career in DC might hit the stratosphere. You’re already one of the better field agents the bureau has. I hope you like dealing with bureaucratic bullshit and sitting behind a desk. Because that’s what a stellar record with the bureau gets you.” “Is that so?” she asked. “Then why aren’t you parked behind a desk yet?” He smirked at her. “That stings, White.” He reached out and took her hand. She could feel tension in his grip but there was the usual degree of comfort at his touch as well. She was grateful that he was with her. While she was usually all for tackling things on her own, even she had to admit that she was going to need the moral and emotional support that only Ellington could provide if she had any hope of wrapping this case up. She held onto his hand as the Midwest continued to roll by beneath them. Nebraska drew closer and closer, the plane pulled on by that magnetic hold that Mackenzie’s past seemed to have over her.