Dead Reckoning Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Epigraph

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  EPILOGUE

  Teaser chapter

  Praise for DEPTH PERCEPTION

  “A tightly written novel of romantic suspense by an author at the top of her game.”—All About Romance

  FADE TO RED

  “Castillo is pushing the envelope. And she is doing a very convincing and, yes, disturbingly good job . . . This is not a book for the fainthearted . . . If you like nothing better than an adrenaline rush and a hero and heroine possessing multiple character layers, then be assured that Fade to Red will be exactly what you are looking for and so much more.”

  —A Romance Review

  “A throwback to the old days of romantic suspense . . . chilling . . . Great character development, an ability to totally immerse the reader into the sleazy underbelly of porn and cause a shiver or two.” —Romance Reviews Today

  “Enlightening and original.” —The Romance Reader

  “Chillingly graphic—romantic suspense at its best.”

  —The Best Reviews

  THE SHADOW SIDE

  “An electrifying chiller rife with action and passion . . . splendid.” —The Dallas Morning News

  “The Shadow Side is exhilarating romantic suspense . . . never slows down until the final moment. Read this thriller.” —Midwest Book Review

  “Stunning. A masterpiece of suspense polished off with a raw romance. This book, the best romantic suspense I’ve ever read, knocked me out. The characters were hot, the story was downright chilling . . . but so compelling. The pace constantly keeps you on the edge . . . giving you twists and turns and never giving you any clues as to what’s going to happen next . . . until the very last minute! Don’t miss this thriller; you’ll be sorry if you do. They don’t come any better than this.” —Romance and Friends

  THE PERFECT VICTIM

  “Castillo has a winner! I couldn’t stop turning the pages!”

  —Kat Martin, New York Times bestselling author of The Fire Inside

  “The Perfect Victim is a gripping page-turner. Peopled with fascinating characters and intricately plotted . . . compelling suspense that never lets up. A first-class reading experience!” —Katherine Sutcliffe, bestselling author of Darkling, I Listen and Obsession

  “An exciting thriller . . . action-packed [and] powerful . . . a strong tale that fans of suspense will love.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “Intense action . . . sizzling sex . . . a thrilling climax . . . the reader is carried along on the ride.”

  —Lynn Erickson, author of After Hours

  “Linda Castillo delivers a powerhouse punch.”

  —Merline Lovelace, author of After Midnight

  “Realistic dialogue, beautifully vivid descriptions, and an intricate plot add up to a chilling, fast-paced, riveting read.”—Library Journal

  “Both romantic and suspenseful—and in nearly equal measures. If you’re looking for a real page-turner with a strong and determined heroine, and an even stronger, even more determined hero, you’ve found it.”

  —All About Romance

  “I couldn’t put this book down . . . The escalating suspense and sexual tension pushes the story forward and keeps you hooked. Not many authors keep me up all night but Linda has succeeded with this riveting read.”—The Best Reviews

  Titles by Linda Castillo

  THE PERFECT VICTIM

  THE SHADOW SIDE

  FADE TO RED

  DEPTH PERCEPTION

  DEAD RECKONING

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)

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  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

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  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South

  Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  DEAD RECKONING

  A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley Sensation edition / December 2005

  Copyright © 2005 by Linda Castillo.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-0-425-20720-8

  BERKLEY® SENSATION

  Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY SENSATION and the “B” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  This book is dedicated to all of my friends at the Round Barn in Little Elm, Texas. Lisa Collins. Lynne Swensen. Angela Lance. Betti Coffey. Claire and Roxanne Klugman. Janet Roskopf. Jessica Wlodarczyk. Joanne Hamm. Nancy Ratcliff. Craig and Marla Gaby. Jesus and Cecilia Castro. Mary Brown. Debi Michnick. Lisa Raskins. Trisha Stevens. And of course the horses: Sky, Donovan, Murphy, Paxton, Misty, Arnie, Apache, Tehya, Chelsea, Wizard, Bay, Tucker, Governor, and Bailey. Thanks for all the fun times. I miss you guys!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Special thanks to former state prosecutor Debbie Benko for so patiently and expertly answering my questions about the inner workings of the district attorney’s office.

  A huge thank-you to insurance compliance officer and fellow writer Susan Jarna
gin for helping me through the complex world of the insurance industry.

  I would also like to thank Scott Garland, former assistant district attorney, for sharing your knowledge and taking the time to answer all of my crazy questions.

  Any and all mistakes contained in the book are from my own lack of understanding or my taking literary license to make the story and plot work.

  “The prince of darkness is a gentleman.”

  —WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

  PROLOGUE

  SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 2:53 A.M.

  Cashiering at the Snack and Gas wasn’t the dream job Evangeline Worth had always imagined, but then she’d always had big dreams. When she was fifteen she’d wanted to be a Las Vegas showgirl. At seventeen she’d had her heart set on becoming a soap opera actress in New York City. Her mama had wanted her to go to college to become a veterinarian because Evangeline had always had a way with animals.

  But time and circumstance had a way of chipping away at dreams. Like a thousand other young women, Evangeline had slowly learned to settle for less and make do with what she had. Now, at the age of thirty-six, twice divorced and the mother of four, Evangeline figured she was lucky to have a job at all.

  Honestly, working at the Snack and Gas wasn’t so bad. Mama complained about the hours, which were midnight to eight A.M., and the neighborhood, which had been on the decline for too many years to count. But Evangeline didn’t mind the hours or the neighborhood. The cops stopped by for coffee at least once during her shift. And she’d never felt the least bit scared, even though the coffee shop down the street had been robbed twice in the last six months.

  The real pleasure of working at the Snack and Gas was her coworker. Irma Trevino might be sixty-two years old and as crazy as the day was long, but she knew how to have fun. With Irma around, the eight hours Evangeline spent selling beer and gas didn’t seem quite so mundane.

  “You going to stand there staring into space all night or are you going to help me stock these sandwiches?”

  Evangeline looked at her coworker over the top of the cash register and smiled at her scolding tone. “Oh, don’t be so prickly, Irma. I told you I’d help.”

  “Telling me you’re going to help and doing the work are two different things.”

  Shaking her head in feigned exasperation, Evangeline started for the sandwich display cooler at the rear where Irma stood. As she rounded the counter, she glanced through the front window, saw the blue pickup truck idle slowly past the pumps and park near the door. “You’re going to have to wait another minute while I ring up this customer.”

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake.” Irma glared at her over the display of Powder Puff doughnut boxes, but Evangeline knew that meangrandma look was an act. Irma was about as mean as a Labrador pup. One that liked to growl a lot.

  The bell on the front door jingled, and a thin young man with a day’s growth of beard and scraggly brown hair entered the store. You never knew who you were going to get at three o’clock in the morning, so Evangeline always made it a point to look. She and Irma had once talked about what they would do if they ever got robbed. Irma had said, “Give them the money like it was on fire, then get on the floor. Decent robber ain’t going to shoot no woman.”

  Evangeline had never reconciled the word decent with robber, but she’d thought that maybe even amongst Dallas’s criminal element there must be some slapdash code of honor.

  But the young man who’d entered didn’t look like a robber. Just a regular guy out for beer and cigarettes. There were a lot of those in this neighborhood. People just trying to get by. As long as he wasn’t drunk, he wouldn’t give them any problems.

  Head down, he huddled in his coat as he passed the candy display. His boots thudded against the tile as he walked to the cooler at the back of the store and grabbed a six-pack of Budweiser. Evangeline glanced at the television where a Seinfeld rerun blinked in and out of focus. One of these days they were going to have to put an antenna on that thing. Or else shoot it and put it out of its misery.

  The man walked to the checkout and set the beer on the counter.

  “Evenin’.” Evangeline gave him only half of her attention as she punched the sku number into the cash register from memory. “That be all?”

  “Yup.”>

  She heard Seinfeld say something funny and smiled as she reached for a bag. Vaguely, she was aware of the man reaching for his wallet. Laughter on the television behind her. The crackle of cellophane from where Irma was stocking sandwiches.

  She’d just hit the Total key when in her peripheral vision she saw the man pull something long and dark from beneath his coat. For an instant, Evangeline thought it was a baseball bat. Then she looked up and saw the sawed-off shotgun.

  Adrenaline slammed into her with the force of a speeding bus. He raised the gun. The ensuing blast deafened her, and the security camera mounted above the TV exploded into a million pieces. Evangeline yelped like a hurt dog when he cocked his head and looked at her.

  “I’ll get you the money,” she said, her heart rolling into a hard pound.

  She wasn’t that afraid. She didn’t like the looks of that shotgun, but she didn’t think he was going to hurt them. Still, her hands were shaking when she punched in the code to open the register. “I can’t get the safe open,” she said.

  “I don’t give a fuck about the safe,” he snarled, glancing out the window toward the pumps. “Just get on the floor like a good bitch.”

  She thought that was an odd thing for him to say about the safe. There was barely two hundred dollars in the register. It was company policy for them to drop the twenties into the safe at least twice during the shift. Irma had made the drop fifteen minutes ago. She hoped he wasn’t pissed when he found out he was risking prison time for two hundred bucks.

  She glanced at Irma, hoping the other woman would stay out of sight. A cold finger of dread scraped up Evangeline’s spine when she saw Irma walking toward them, her face stern and unafraid. Too unafraid, Evangeline thought. She tried to catch the other woman’s gaze, but Irma either didn’t see her or chose to ignore her.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Irma demanded.

  The man spun. The second blast rocked the store. Evangeline saw Irma fly backward, her arms flailing, her face a mosaic of horror and shock. Red bloomed like a bloody rose on her white blouse. Then her small body crashed through the beef jerky display and lay motionless on the floor.

  Evangeline heard a scream. A scream that was shrill and terrified and seemed to go on and on. Then she realized the sound was coming from her. She couldn’t catch her breath. Her heart was pounding so hard she thought her ribs might break. Terror was a violent tornado inside her, pulsing and spinning out of control.

  Her eyes met the man’s. He had a pale complexion. Blue eyes. Whiskers on pitted skin. “Why did you do that?” she screamed. “I gave you the money! Why did you do that?”

  “Shut the fuck up!”

  But she was already rushing toward her friend. “Irma!”

  Behind her, she heard the sound of steel sliding against steel, and it suddenly dawned on her that he was going to shoot her. Oh, God, no! Please!

  Another layer of terror enveloped her when she looked over her shoulder and saw him raise the shotgun. “No!” she screamed, thinking of her children. “I have babies!”

  Arms outstretched, she pivoted, changed direction, and sprinted toward the rear exit. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Irma. Her small white face surrounded by a pool of blood the size of an ocean.

  Evangeline didn’t hear the shot. But the blast hit her in the back like a baseball bat slamming in a home run. Her breath left her lungs in a rush. A terrible sound tore from her throat. Pain exploded between her shoulder blades. When she looked down she saw blood and for an instant wondered how she could bleed in the front when she’d been shot in the back.

  And then she was falling.

  She tried to break her fall, but her arms refused the command.
An instant later the floor rushed up. Her head slammed against the tile. Black and white stars exploded behind her eyes. The world went still.

  The knowledge that she’d been shot registered in her brain. She wanted to move, to run. If she could get out the back door, she might be able to get away. But her arms and legs refused the command. Oh, God, why couldn’t she move?

  She opened her eyes, realized she was lying on her stomach. She saw a pale hand speckled with blood and tissue. The hand was twitching. Shock rippled through her when she realized it was hers.

  Vaguely, she was aware of the thud of boots against tile. She wanted to see if the man had gone but couldn’t move. But deep inside she knew he hadn’t left. That he wasn’t finished with her. That maybe the worse was yet to come.

  “Turn over,” he said.

  Evangeline tried to speak. She opened her mouth to form the words, tasted the metallic tang of blood and realized the bullet had paralyzed her. She couldn’t run. Couldn’t move. Helplessness and horror exploded inside her. And she thought, Oh, dear God, take me now. . . .

  The sound of his zipper being yanked down registered in her brain, and she wondered what had happened to this man to make him so depraved.

  She could hear his boots shuffling against the floor. He cursed as he yanked at her skirt and panties. She closed her eyes when the fabric ripped. It was unreal, lying on the floor, shot and bleeding and unable to feel any of it. She was aware of her body being jostled, but her nerves were dead to sensation. Then he was on top of her. His body against hers, moving, rocking her back and forth. She could see his hand braced against the floor a few inches from her face. He was grunting like an animal. Cursing her . . .

  The assault was over quickly. Evangeline lay there, paralyzed and helpless and wondering if he was going to let her live.