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before she could speak. The Governor of California was President Hague’s first choice as replacement VP, and the man was growing impatient for answers.
    “Yep, he finished last night. Florentine checks out”— Thank, God —“But that’s not why I’m calling. Look,” she continued, cutting him off as he opened his mouth to ask why it had taken them this long to contact him. “I got a phone call from an old friend of mine, Agent Lucas Randall out of Charlotte. He was in charge of the Meacher case?” Frazer checked personnel files online as she spoke. He remembered the guy. “He’s been called in on a case along the Outer Banks. Wanted me to go down there to help him out.”
    Frazer searched the Internet for news stories coming out of that region. “A single victim homicide?” He had a stack of unsolved cases on his desk more than a foot high, not to mention trying to help a certain spook surreptitiously track down the assassin who’d murdered the Vice President last month. All of which required a few more skills than investigating a small-town homicide. “The locals can handle it.” He winced at the callousness of his tone. That’s what happened when reports of unbelievable depravity crossed your desk every single day.
    Rooney ignored him. “Two teens making out on the beach last night were subject to a vicious assault. Both were left for dead, but one miraculously survived. But that’s not why Randall called me.”
    Frazer’s spine tingled, and he knew he wasn’t going to like whatever she said next.
    “The female victim was wearing a medical alert bracelet.”
    “And?” Tension coiled inside him.
    “It wasn’t hers.” He heard the murmur of voices, probably Alex Parker telling Mallory to get off the phone and take a break on a federal holiday. “It belonged to a woman called Beverley Sandal.”
    “Why do I recognize that name?” He typed it into the Internet. “Damn.”
    “Yeah. Exactly.”
    His brain catalogued some of the factors in play. “Ferris Denker is due to be executed this month.”
    “I know.”
    “It could be a copycat trying to get him a last minute reprieve.”
    “I know.”
    “This was Hanrahan’s first big case—did you know that?” He squeezed his eyes shut. Of course she did. Rooney was as big a workaholic as he was. Goddammit. The conviction was solid. Denker had been transporting the body of a young woman he’d killed when the cops pulled him over on a traffic violation. He’d confessed to a series of murders, though some of the bodies had never been recovered. The conviction was good, but the last thing he or Rooney or Parker needed was investigators digging into his former boss’s cases. “I need you to get down there ASAP—”
    “I can’t.”
    His spine stiffened. Something was wrong.
    Another voice came on the line. “What she failed to mention was she’s in the hospital.” Alex Parker had taken the phone from Rooney. “She, hmm…” He cleared his throat. “Mal had some minor bleeding last night, and the docs want to keep her in and run more tests. Maybe put her on bed rest for a couple of weeks. You’re going to have to do this without us.”
    Fear jackknifed through Frazer. Rooney was in the first trimester of her pregnancy with the couple’s baby. Frazer was usually more cautious with his affection, but his friendship with the rookie agent and damaged assassin had begun under extraordinary circumstances. The connection was strong as tungsten steel, the only thing that would break it was death—a real possibility if anyone discovered their secrets. “Is she all right?” he asked carefully.
    “She will be.”
    Mallory Rooney was the best of them. If anyone could keep her safe it would be Alex Parker, but not even Parker could control a medical emergency. Frazer knew the thoughts going through the man’s head. Guilt. Fear, that this was somehow his fault. Desperation and panic that he couldn’t fix it no matter how badly he wanted