Cast the First Stone Read online

  How? I’ll figure that part out later.

  I reach over Eve’s shoulder and point to a listing down the page. “What is that article about a protest?”

  It’s something from a Canadian news site about an organized protest. Eve reads it as fast as I do.

  “It looks like Good Earth coffee was named by the protesters as one of the perpetrators of child labor,” she says, summing up what I’ve just read. “There’s a long list.”

  “Who are the protesters?”

  “A conglomerate group. The article mentions Free the Children, a couple church groups, and the International Child Labor Defense League.”

  “Yahoo that.” That sounds weird. Apparently “Google it” doesn’t translate. “Search for the Child Labor Defense League,” I say, simplifying.

  She’s already typing it in and a few hits come up. “It’s a group out of DC. They’ve been involved in a number of protests around the country. Here’s one in Oregon, and another in New York City.”

  She pulls up the article. “Oh, wow, they’re not exactly peaceful. Seattle. The burning of…a coffee shop.”

  “Was anyone arrested?” I’m reading it too, but Eve’s always been a faster reader than me.

  “A couple people. Gus Silva and…Jo De Paulo.”

  “Do a search—”

  But she’s already typing, and there is a hit for a Gustavo Silva, Brazilian footballer.

  Brazilian.

  “He immigrated to the US a year ago with D.C. United,” Eve says. “And was arrested about three months later.”

  I sit back and shake my head. “What is a Brazilian footballer doing hooked up with a child labor protest group in Seattle?”

  “According to the Child Labor Defense League, Brazil is one of the leading countries that uses child slave labor to pick their beans.”

  “Interesting. Where is Gustavo from in Brazil?”

  “There’s a picture of his team.” She’s pulled up the team roster. “Wow, about half these guys are international.” She is scrolling down and right about the middle of the page, my gut clenches.

  “Stop.” I point to the screen. “That’s Ramses.”

  “The guy you chased today?”

  I nod and it’s all I can do to sit here, every corpuscle in my body on fire. “I knew it.”

  “You think he’s involved with the Child Labor Defense League?”

  “He and Gustavo.”

  She has clicked on Gustavo’s picture, and is reading his stats. “He’s from a village in the State of Espirito Santo…” She clicks on Ramses pictures. “Bingo. Same as Ramses.”

  “They knew each other in Brazil.”

  She’s typing again, and the awkwardness of feeling older, even more experienced is starting to dim, flushed away by that familiar, sweet jazz we get when we’re onto something.

  “The State of Espirito Santo is the biggest producer of Robusta coffee beans in the world.”

  “So these two boys escaped, through soccer. Except, why would Mariana not bring her son with her when she left Brazil?”

  Eve looks at me. “Who?”

  “Ramses’s mother. Mariana Vega. I know she is divorced, but—”

  “Mariana Vega. Of the Vega Family coffee growers?” She is pointing to a listing on the original protest site. “What if she couldn’t bring him?” Eve turns, her hazel-green eyes alight. “I’ve heard stories of drug lords keeping mothers from seeing their children, from immigrating.”

  “Eve, you’re brilliant,” I say, and it’s a such an easy, common word between us that it takes me by surprise when her eyes widen, a smile tipping her lips.

  It hits me that this is the first time she’s heard that from me and my throat thickens because I’m realizing that I’m not only rewriting the bombings.

  Eve really likes me. The spark in her eye is easy, the smile lit with something inviting and if I’m reading her right—and let’s not jump to any conclusions because I don’t have the most attuned emotional barometer—I’ve somehow accelerated our romance by about a year.

  Hooyah.

  I’m trying not to act on the pulse between us. “It’s not a difficult leap to suggest that Gustavo had friends—or even family—pressed into the coffee bean labor pool. And maybe Ramses saw it. Maybe he even became sympathetic to Gustavo’s point of view.”

  “Maybe Gustavo recruited him for the Child Labor Defense League.”

  “But why is Ramses here, in Minneapolis, and not playing on the team?”

  She clicked on his photo. “He’s on the injured list.”

  “He didn’t look injured when he was doing his 100 meter sprint today. See if you can find out anything else. I think it’s time I have another chat with Mariana and her son.”

  Just like that, as if I can hear it, something clicks inside my brain.

  Maybe I never heard of Ramses because he was killed in the third bombing. A voyeur to his own crime, drawn in too close to the flames.

  “I heard Booker tell you to stay away from her.” Eve looks at me, but as soon as the words are out of her mouth, she bites her lip. “I mean—sorry.”

  She has a point. More, probably Ramses isn’t going to give up anything—not unless I haul him down to the precinct for a face to face. It’s a good bet Mariana won’t open her door to me. And, I’m not getting a warrant after today’s tackle.

  “He didn’t tell Burke to stay away, though.” I pull out my cell phone and Burke is on speed dial. He’s grouchy and not a little irked that I abandoned him this afternoon—an opinion he didn’t spare when I returned, two hours later, the meeting in Stillwater spinning in my head.

  The watch is working.

  Whatever. Right now, all I know is that my instincts are also working, and I ignore Burke’s late night ire and update him on what Eve and I have found.

  “It can’t wait until morning?” he asks, and for a moment, I’m stymied.

  He’s already suspicious of me. How did you know? The memory of his disbelief, his fury this morning punches through my thoughts.

  I don’t know how long I’m going to be trapped here, and frankly the last thing I need in my suddenly off-kilter world is to lose Burke’s trust. Still, we’re running out of time. “What if Ramses is on the run? Or worse, planning to hit another coffee shop. Maybe even tomorrow morning?”

  I don’t sound desperate, so that’s good, but I let the question linger in the quiet.

  It also occurs to me that if we have Ramses, and he’s our bomber, then the nightmare is over.

  “I just got home from a gig.”

  Right. Burke is still a jazz drummer, even in my time, but now he’s playing for a band that is making a name in Minneapolis. Someday, Sticks, as he’s called, will have to make a choice between his police work and his music.

  You know what he chose. So maybe that’s why he’s not a fan of my creative choice. I hadn’t really considered that before.

  Still, “Then I’m not interrupting anything. Get up and do me a solid, bro. Just go pick him up. I’ll meet you at the station.”

  I am not sure if that is a curse I hear, but he mumbles something and hangs up.

  “I did a check on the US distributor of Good Earth coffee. It’s out of Chicago, but their offices are closed.”

  “I need a list of coffee shops that use this brand.” I shake my head. “We could use a hacker.”

  She laughs. “Right. You and my brother—he’s always trying to ‘hack’ into things. This isn’t the movies, Rem.”

  I didn’t know that about Asher. But then again, he died before he could show the world who he was.

  Not this time.

  My phone buzzes. It’s Burke, texting to tell me that he’s on his way to Ramses’ house.

  I glance at the clock. After eleven. We have eight hours, if my sketchy memory is
even remotely correct.

  Eve stands up. “I’m heading home, but let me know how it goes with Ramses.”

  I stop myself from reaching out and tugging on a strand of that twisty red hair, and instead nod. I grab my jacket and am about to start searching the city’s coffee shops when Burke texts me again to meet him at the precinct office.

  The parking lot is dark save for the puddle of light from the overhead streetlight. Moths dart through the glow, shadows against the pavement. The air is balmy, seasoned with a hint of freshly mowed grass and the slightest tinge of late night moisture. A breeze lifts my shirt.

  I’m leaning against my car when lights stripe the lot and I make out Burke’s Integra. He pulls up behind me, not in a space, and leaves the car running.

  His expression is gnarled and edgy when he gets out, and it occurs to me that maybe I did interrupt something.

  Naw. Burke is even more of a loner than I am. He works out, reads, and come to think of it, loves time travel books.

  Ironic.

  “What?” I ask, before he can attack.

  “He’s not there.” He shuts the door to his still running car.

  “What—?”

  “The house was lit up, so I knocked, and Mariana Vega answered the door. Said Ramses had gone out—she didn’t know where.”

  I stifle a curse but Burke frowns at me. “So we get him tomorrow—”

  “No, we gotta stake out his house, grab him the second he gets back.”

  Burke is giving me a look like he did this morning, or even last night. “What’s going on, Rem?”

  Doggone it. “I just think…it’s a—”

  “I swear to you if you say this is a hunch, you’ll lose teeth.”

  I close my mouth. Finally, “I was right last night. Why won’t you just trust me?”

  I’ve done it now, because I just might be the only person Burke trusts. And he has his reasons, but I know I’ve delivered a jab.

  “Fine.” His mouth tightens “Let’s go.”

  “No. I have to…well, I have to figure out how to hack into a database in Chicago.”

  Burke just stares at me. Shakes his head.

  Gets in his car without a word.

  And I point my Camaro toward a little bungalow on Webster Ave South.

  Chapter 16

  You’re brilliant.

  Eve didn’t know why those words lit up her entire body—Rembrandt probably meant it as a throw away comment, something he might say to Burke, or even Silas if he helped him track down a lead.

  So she should simply calm down. Stop thinking about the way he straddled that chair, his forearms ropy and strong, resting on the back. The way he leaned past her, pointing at the screen, surrounding her with his scent—a mix of the sultry summer air and a thoroughly masculine residue of his morning exertions. Stop thinking about the softening timbre of his voice when he looked at her as if seeing her for the first time and said, I think I would start all the good things sooner.

  All the good things.

  As if they included her.

  I could kiss you.

  He hadn’t meant that, either, but the shock of those words still sluiced through her.

  She turned off the shower and let her body shiver for a moment before she stepped out and grabbed a towel. The weariness of the day had sloughed off her, but she still longed for her warm bed, if she could get her brain to shut off.

  Tracking down the leads with Rembrandt only stirred up more questions. Like, where in Ramses’ or even Gustavo’s resume did it mention familiarity with bomb making procedures? More likely, they’d befriended someone inside the ICDL who could handle explosives.

  Maybe they needed to take another look at the ICDL, something she’d mention to Rem—Inspector Stone—in the morning.

  Despite what he said, she needed to stop thinking of him as Rem. As if they were more than work acquaintances. She couldn’t deny that something about him, however—an aura of confidence, even the brazen courage to run after his hunches—nudged at a place inside her that longed to step outside her methodology and lists to follow her instincts.

  What would you regret?

  His question rattled inside her as she pulled on a pair of sweatpants, a T-shirt, and fuzzy socks for her perpetually frozen toes and headed downstairs to her freshly tiled kitchen. A light glowed over the stove and she opened the refrigerator. One of her brother’s beers remained, but she grabbed a yogurt and headed over to the counter to fetch a spoon.

  The knock at the door made her jerk. She turned. Glanced at the clock. After midnight.

  She slowly slid out the drawer at the end of the counter and eased out her police-issue Glock.

  Not that a criminal would knock, but…

  Holding it at her side, she flicked on the porch light. Her brother had suggested a stained glass door, so she couldn’t make out the figure standing there.

  She glanced through the sidelight window.

  A man. He had his back to the door, but wore a pair of dress pants, no jacket, his shirt sleeves rolled up, wide shoulders, lean waist—

  “Inspector Stone?” She opened the door and he turned.

  The shadows of the overhead light against the two-day growth of his whiskers turned his face gritty, and the look in his blue eyes suggested all business. He glanced at the Glock in her hand and raised an eyebrow.

  “Okay, good idea. For the record, I like the preparedness, but I promise I’m not here to attack you, rob you, or in any way cause trouble.” His mouth cranked up one side.

  She glanced at the gun, then set the weapon on a table by the door. “It’s late. So—”

  “Like I said, good choice. Keep that instinct. But…I need your help, Eve.” He stuck his hands into his pockets and then gave her such a sheepish, almost boyish look she didn’t know what else to do.

  “Come in.”

  He stepped over the threshold. “Nice place. Smells like you’ve been working on it.”

  “Yeah. My brother just finished the kitchen, but I’m about done with remodeling. I just need to paint the dining room and add a deck.” She walked past him and turned on a family room lamp. Light washed over her leather sofa, across to her fireplace. “I’ll be happy if I never remodel again.”

  A low chuckle rumbled through him. “I’ll remember that.”

  The way he said it made it sound like they were already friends, and would be for a long time. She turned, her gaze quick over him. He stood in her entry way, watching her, and his shoulders lifted and fell, his expression suddenly awkward, as if realizing he had bridged the line between work and her personal life.

  In fact, wait— “How did you know where I live?”

  He lifted one side of his mouth. “Eve. I’m a detective.”

  Oh. Right.

  Something she couldn’t identify slipped into his gaze and she was suddenly, keenly aware of the fact that indeed, he’d stepped over that line, right into her living room.

  Oh boy. “How did it go with Ramses?”

  “He’s out of pocket. Burke is staked out at his house, but…I gotta get into that data base of distributors of Good Earth coffee in our area.”

  “Tonight?” She didn’t mean it quite how it sounded, but—

  “I know it sounds crazy, Eve, but I just…” The look in his eyes turned solemn, even a little fierce. “I just know that there will be another bombing in the morning, and we have to figure out where.”

  It was how he said it, so much conviction, so much oomph in his voice, she felt it to her bones, adopted it and made it her own. “Okay.”

  “Okay?” He blinked at her.

  “How can I help?”

  He drew in a breath, as if surprised, but he had called her brilliant.

  And sure, Rembrandt might be a little impulsive, maybe even had a dark side,
but no one could accuse him of giving up. Or not caring about the people who had lost their lives—who could lose their lives—if the bomber wasn’t found.

  No wonder he never had any cold cases.

  “I was thinking your brother—”

  “Asher?”

  “Can he really hack into websites?”

  “I think so. But—”

  “Is he still living with your parents?”

  Now this was weird, because—

  “You mentioned that he was younger than you, so I just assumed.”

  Oh. But he swallowed, rather oddly.

  “Yeah, he’s at home. I think. Probably.”

  “Let’s go.” He started toward the door.

  “I’m in my pajamas.”

  He glanced at her. “Those are your pajamas? Trust me, you’re fine.”

  Hmmm.

  He opened the door. She took off her socks, slipped on flip flops and headed outside.

  A black Camaro sat under the lights. The sight of it stirred a dangerous flame inside her. Like she might be in high school, sneaking out of—or in this case, into—her house.

  She settled in beside him and as he turned the car over, a classic rock tune queued up. “Lonely People,” by America.

  He was drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he headed towards Minnetonka.

  “You know where my parents live, too?”

  He glanced at her, then, a deer in the headlights expression. “Uh, no, I was guessing—”

  “Don’t give me that. You’re a detective.”

  “Sorry.”

  “You’re as bad as my dad. This is why I had no dates in high school. Dad did a background check on everyone.”

  “Everyone?”

  “Maybe just the troublemakers.”

  “You like the troublemakers, Eve?”

  Her eyes widened. “What? No.”

  He was grinning, though. 38 Special’s “I Want You Back” came on and he started to hum.

  “I prefer to stay out of trouble, thanks.”

  “Which is why you’re here, about to sneak into your old house—”