Page 85 of Final Approach

“You can’t drive after what just happened. I’ll drive you home. We’ll take your car and I’ll figure out how to get back later.”

He started to protest and she held up a hand. “Please. No arguing with me on this, okay?”

“Okay. Fine.” He nodded. “Let’s finish up here, take Emily her lemonade, then you can take me home.”

“Good plan.”

She stepped out of hearing range of her father and the officers and swiped the screen.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey, I’m sorry I missed your call, but I was on the phone with my SAC.”

“I was just calling to see how things were going, but now I have another reason.”

“What’s that?”

“My dad was just attacked in the hospital and I think I recognized his attacker.”

“What! Who?”

“Erik Leary.”

ANDREWSTRAIGHTENEDfrom his slouched position in the safe house recliner and stood. “Erik Leary? You’re sure?”

Nathan’s head snapped up at the mention of Leary’s name. Andrew put her on speakerphone as Cole took a seat.

“Yeah, maybe. I didn’t get a good look at him before he bolted, but he should be on the security footage.”

Andrew rubbed his chin and sighed while he thought. “Okay, obviously there’s some kind of connection with Leary and the hijacking. And you said yourself, it could be related to your mother’s.”

“So Leary is coming after my family now?” Kristine said. “Was he responsible for my mother’s hijacking?” She sighed. “That doesn’t seem possible. He’s not old enough. He’s what, thirty-two?”

“Yeah.”

“So it’s not him. But also, why would he be on a plane that he knew could possibly go down? Again, that doesn’t seem likely. He didn’t seem like he was ready to end it. And for what? Money? Then where is it?” She finished that last question on a rush of breath. “Sorry, I just have lots of thoughts. Unfortunately, I have no answers.”

Andrew frowned. “What if we need to look at this from a different perspective?”

“Okay. Like?”

“So, from all the information gathered, it looks like we weren’t supposed to crash. Let’s assume the plane was supposed to land somewhere safe. Why would someone want to hijack a plane that we’re all on, most specificallyyouwere on, if we’re going to speculate that the same person who hijacked your mom’s plane didn’t actually want it to crash as well, but something went wrong and the plane went down?”

She went quiet. “Okay. Can you explain your reasoning?”

Andrew rubbed a hand down his face. “Could it have been a distraction from something else?”

“Like what?” Kristine asked.

“No idea. What was going down at the same time?” Andrew walked to the desk in the corner of the room and rummaged. “I need a pen and paper.” Once he had what he needed, he returned to his seat and began writing while thinking out loud. “Okay, sinceour crime board is at the station, let’s do this the old-fashioned way. One, the person behind the hijacker chose someone who didn’t have a whole lot to lose if he failed, but a lot to gain for his family if he succeeded. Any connection between Marcus Brown and Kristine’s mom, Rachel Duncan?” He drew two stick figures and labeled them, then drew a line between them with a question mark over it.

“None,” Nathan said. “His background barrel has been emptied and scraped. There’s nothing there. Same with the wife, Tabitha. Nothing connects her to Kristine’s family in any way. And Jacob’s father told him where the money was the day before the hijacking.”

“But who was in their house that night?” Kristine asked. “That wasn’t Jacob, it was a man. Could it have been the person who paid Marcus, then decided to come back for the money?”

“That’s my guess,” Andrew said. “Two, the connection between the Serpentine Network and Marcus.”

“Nonexistent,” Hank said. “That tat was just a red herring. But whoever hired Marcus was either familiar with the gang or researched it so he could give Brown a picture of what to get. But that’s easy enough.”