Chapter 2

"Walker, d'you have a minute?"

"More than that. Alex is working late." The Ranger paused. "What brings you down here at this hour?"

Carlos came the rest of the way into the office and dropped into a chair in front of the desk, glad everyone else had apparently gone home for the day. "Crisis of conscience. You hear about the murder down near Trent's place?"

"Yeah. Heard you got an eyewitness too."

The detective nodded slowly. "I do, but… Walker, I gotta ask you something, in confidence."

The older man clasped his hands on the desk in front of him and nodded. "What's on your mind?"

"Witness says that the killer was slim, blond, and trained in hand-to-hand combat."

"That's it?" Walker frowned. "There are a lot of people who would fit that description."

"But not a lot who knew her and fought with her the night before." This was getting harder by the second; Walker had known Trent much longer than he'd known Carlos, and almost saw him as a son.

"You have a suspect already?" Surprise was evident in the Ranger's voice, and at his next words, Carlos cringed inwardly. "Why haven't you brought him in yet? Can't find him?"

"Oh, I can find him; I talked to him this morning." Somehow, this conversation wasn't going quite as he'd planned. But then, nothing ever seemed to with Walker; he always felt like the man could see right through him and read his mind. Now was no exception. "Walker, it's Trent."

For the first time in the nearly three years since he'd met the Ranger, the man had been rendered completely speechless. When he regained control over his thought processes, though, he was all business, in a way that Carlos admired. "You said he knows her? Fought with her?"

"Yeah; I saw them last night; I'd stopped by the dojo to ask him if he wanted to go out. They were there, arguing over her wanting to do something and him wanting to stop her. She said he couldn't stop her, he said he could think of a few ways, and she said he wouldn't dare."

"You talked to him today, asked him about it?" Carlos nodded. "What'd he say?"

"Not much. He said they were working together, and the ways he talked about included calling her boss and calling you."

"Me?"

A second time in one night he'd managed to catch Walker by surprise. Why couldn't he do this when he was in a mood to gloat about it? "Yeah. I don't know why. He wouldn't tell me what he was working on; he wouldn't tell me who her boss is. He says there are lives at stake and people have died already."

"Something doesn't seem right."

Carlos choked. "No kidding." He stood up and began to pace back and forth. "He couldn't have done it, Walker. But… he fits the description, he has the training, he was arguing with her. What I heard last night can easily be made to sound like a threat."

"Do you think it was?"

"No!" The word came out more forceful than he'd intended it to. "You know him, Walker. He's… he's incapable of killing someone when they deserve it, never mind murdering someone in cold blood. There's just no way."

"Then what's the problem, Carlos?"

"It's not that I don't believe him; it's that I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to prove he didn't do it. His story doesn't make sense, Walker."

"How so?"

Carlos frowned. The man ought to show at least a little emotion. "I came in around quarter to ten. She was there, they fought. The started to calm down, and I left, about five of ten. Trent said she left probably ten minutes after I did. That doesn't work with her being a block away an hour later, when the bum said he saw her attacked."

"You're sure he's right about the time?"

"Clock outside a bank across the street."

"You mention that to Trent?"

He shook his head, forcing himself to sit down again. "Didn't want to get barked at for giving him too much information, if I do end up having to bring him in."

"I don't know that there's any 'if' about it, Carlos. Have you told anyone what you know?"

"Not yet. I didn't know what to do."

"You can't help Trent if it looks like you're trying to cover something up. Do your job, investigate Trent and the girl, and you'll find the truth."

"I don't know, Walker…"

"I'll look into it too. Tomorrow, I'll have a couple of my people see what they can dig up on her. What's the name?"

"Gail Roderick." This was another piece to the puzzle. "That was the name on her license – her handbag was left behind, wallet, money and all – but I haven't been able to find anything on the name. It's the same name Trent gave me though."

Walker looked thoughtful. "I'll talk to Alex; between the two of us we can probably call in a favor or two. I'll let you know what we come up with, as soon as we have anything."

"What do I do in the meantime?"

"You're not gonna like it."

"I don't like anything right now, Walker. No offense."

Finally, the man showed a trace of emotion in a hint of a smile. "None taken. The best thing you can do right now, Carlos, is bring Trent in for questioning. No warrants, no arrest. But bring him downtown, get everything on record, make sure it's all letter-perfect. The less anyone can accuse you of in this situation, the better it will look for Trent." He paused. "Besides, there's only one way to find out what really happened."

Yeah. Too bad it had to involve dragging his friend's good name through the mud.

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Alex closed one manila folder, placed it on top of a stack of six others, then glanced at the pile still waiting for her attention – twice as high as the other. Just as her fingertips brushed the next, the phone rang. She stared at it for a moment before answering, "If this isn't someone telling me that I've just won a million dollars, I'm hanging up." There was only one person that would be calling her this late.

"Sorry," her husband's voice came over the line. "I'm waiting for that same phone call myself. Maybe we can wait together later?"

"Mmm, sounds good to me. What's up?"

"I need you to do me a favor."

"Oh, Walker," she groaned. "Please don't tell me I have to wake up a judge. One of them already changed his phone number just to hide from me." She couldn't keep from smiling when she heard his deep laugh in response.

"No, no judges. And this can probably wait until morning; I just wanted to give you a heads up before you left work tonight."

"What do you need?"

"Information on a woman named Gail Roderick. It's not her real name; I'd be willing to bet that it's a cover name for a federal agent. All I really need is her real name. I'm going to have Gage and Sydney check her out in the morning."

She scribbled the name on the top of a fresh page of her legal pad and, pen poised over the paper, asked, "Any idea what agency?"

"Not a clue. I'd guess DEA or FBI, but that's really just a shot in the dark. I know it's not much to go on, but it's important we find out who this woman was."

"Who she was? Walker, what's going on?" Alex set the pen down and tightened her grip on the phone. "Walker?"

"She was murdered last night. Carlos Sandoval is the detective assigned to the case, but he's run into a roadblock finding out anything about her."

"What's so important? Sounds like another Jane Doe. What makes you think she was an agent?"

"She was working with Trent on something. We don't know what."

Alex blinked and shook her head slowly. "I don't understand, Walker. If she was working with Trent, why don't you just ask him? Or has something happened to him?" She closed her eyes and held her breath, waiting for his answer.

"No, not yet." There was a heavy silence on the line. "Right now, everything points to Trent as the killer. Carlos has talked to him once, and he wasn't interested in giving him much information, just said that there are too many lives at stake."

"Walker… what would Trent be involved in? I thought he was still taking jobs spying on cheating husbands?" Alex loved Trent; Walker thought of him as a son. But his investigations agency hadn't been the most successful enterprise.

"That's what I need to find out." She could detect just the slightest strain in his voice.

"I'll do what I can. I'll put in a call tonight, actually." Alex paused. "Walker, what's going to happen to Trent?" She didn't know much of the story, but he certainly seemed to be taking it very seriously.

"Carlos is bringing him in for questioning now; we'll find out who's really responsible, but until then, there's really nothing that can be done. Trent has to be treated like the prime suspect."

"Great." Shaking her head she said, "I'll be another hour or so."

"I'll see you at home, Alex." A moment later she heard the click indicating he'd hung up, and she replaced the receiver on the cradle. Then she reached for her rolodex, flipping through until she found the name she was looking for. Knowing him, he'd still be in his office, provided he wasn't in the field. She hoped he wasn't in the field. If he was, she'd be a lot longer than an hour.

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"Have a seat." Carlos gestured toward one of the four chairs in the interrogation room and sat down opposite the one Trent selected. He could almost feel eyes boring into his back, and knew he'd have to put on a good show. He just wasn't sure how much would be show and how much would be the real thing.

"What was the nature of your relationship with Gail Roderick?"

"We were friends, and coworkers."

"How long have you worked with her?"

"Seven months."

"What were you working on?"

Trent met his eyes and held his gaze until Carlos looked away himself. "I can't say."

"Who were you working for?"

"I can't say."

This was going wonderfully. He'd never have let any other suspect get away with giving him answers like that, but this was Trent. He wasn't sure he could bring himself to push the man too far. "Why can't you say?"

"It would endanger people; I can't do that."

Y'know, Carlos, they say it's a sign of insanity to do the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. Why, really, had he thought Trent would give him a different answer this time? He took another angle. "What was her real name?"

Trent blinked, and Carlos felt a twinge of sickening pride at having caught him off-guard. "I… I only ever knew her as Gail. I figured it was a cover name, but I never asked and she never offered the information."

"In the time you worked with her, did you ever practice against her – spar, fight, anything?"

Giving him a confused look, Trent nodded. "Yeah. She'd had some training – a little beyond basic academy-esque hand-to-hand, but I worked with her a lot in our downtime, sometimes even when we were working."

"How skilled was she?"

"She had a long way to go, but she could hold her own."

Carlos closed his eyes for a moment, arguing with himself over whether to ask the next question that had come to mind, certain he shouldn't but knowing he would. "What degree of training would you expect someone to have in order to best her?"

"More than you have," Trent replied, and for just a second, Carlos could see the smile in his friend's eyes that he was accustomed to being there, and he laughed himself.

"That doesn't really say much."

"I know," the martial artist countered. Then he shrugged. "I don't know. Blue belt, maybe. Purple, definitely."

"And what level are you at, for the record?" Another question he knew the answer to.

"Black." It wasn't the most damning part of the interview, but neither was it going to help Trent's case.

Carlos studied him for a few silent minutes and, he noticed, even Trent's training couldn't keep him from shifting under his gaze. There was something he wasn't saying; he'd picked up on it even talking to him in the dojo. As much as he didn't want to try to break him down in front of his colleagues – not only did he not want to do that to his friend, but he wasn't sure he'd win if he tried – he had to do something. Abruptly, he changed the subject.

"What, ah, did you say your relationship with her was?"

Trent looked at him quizzically. "I told you. We were coworkers and friends."

"That's it?" Carlos raised an eyebrow. "What covers were you using? Brother and sister?"

Trent knew where he was going with this; he could see it in his eyes. "No. We were posing as a couple."

As he'd expected. "Married?"

"No. She… was inside first, and brought me in as her boyfriend."

"I've, ah, been undercover a time or two," Carlos said slowly, not that he needed to tell Trent that. The man knew well, both the nature and the outcome of at least one major undercover assignment. "It gets kind of hard to avoid crossing the line between business and pleasure. That, ah, never happened to you two, huh?"

The blond man fidgeted again as he replied in the negative and Carlos's instinct took over, homing in on the weakness he'd detected. "Never? Completely professional relationship?" He stood and folded his arms across his chest. "I don't buy it."

"Carlos—" It was the first time either of them had used the other's name, and as much as his stomach clenched at the thought, he had to use the opening it gave him.

"Malloy," he said coldly, wincing internally as his friend recoiled at the hostility in his voice, "try again. What was the nature of your relationship with Gail Roderick?" He repeated his first question word for word.

There was a long, slightly heart-wrenching silence between them before Trent finally replied, "We were dating."

"Dating," Carlos repeated. "Why'd you lie?"

Trent sighed, and the sound of his resignation echoed through Carlos's mind. "Because I didn't know what to do." His voice took on a sort of calmness that sent a chill down the detective's spine.

"Did you love her?"

Trent's head jerked up, his eyes wide with shock before narrowing abruptly. "What do you think?"

Almost anyone else would have taken that answer as a negative. Carlos, on the other hand, understood the response for exactly what it was. "Well, for someone who was so in love, you don't seem too broken up." He regretted the words instantly, even before he saw the pain in his friend's eyes.

"We all deal with things in different ways," Trent bit out.

It was true; he knew that, and it made his earlier comment all the more cruel. He couldn't even recall Trent crying when his father died. He couldn't say that now, though, so he only replied, "I suppose we do."

He took a deep breath, unable, in good conscience, to continue with this line of questioning. "You saw Gail the night she died, correct?"

"Yes." There was gratitude in Trent's eyes that Carlos didn't entirely feel he deserved.

"What did you talk about?"

"She wanted to do something relating to our… case that I thought was too dangerous, not worth the risk. She told me I couldn't stop her from doing it, and I told her I could think of a few ways."

"What would those ways be? Maybe one that was actually carried out?"

"No!" That was the most emotion he'd heard in the private investigator's voice in this whole session. "I was worried that what she wanted to do was too dangerous. Why would I kill her to stop her from doing it?"

That… was a really good point, and Carlos was at a loss to respond to it. "Why don't you tell me?" It was a copout, and they both knew it.

"I can't tell you, because I didn't kill her."

He couldn't bring himself to challenge Trent on that, and so changed the subject once more. There was one thing left that he hadn't touched on. "What time did she leave Tuesday night?"

"About ten, maybe just after."

"She was a block away when she was killed, just after eleven. Eyewitness was able to give us the exact time. It doesn't take an hour to walk a block." He forced himself to look skeptical. "Any idea where else she might have gone at that hour? There's not much else down in that part of the city."

Trent sighed and shook his head. "I don't know. She shouldn't have gone anywhere else. I made her swear she'd just go home."

Great. Just great. He raked a hand through his hair, trying to figure out how to respond, but was saved when another detective, Rob Davies, opened the door and motioned him over. Speaking in low tones he said, "Captain says to let him go, but tell him not to leave the city."

Carlos gave a short nod as Davies took his leave, then turned back to face his childhood friend. "You're free to go, but don't leave town." As Trent stood slowly, Carlos reached a hand out. "C'mon, I'll take you home."

"Don't bother; I'll call my mother."

"Trent—" But he walked out without another word.