criminal family who had slipped the net on his last operation.
Courtesy of the injuries he had sustained getting Natalie and tiny Jared out of the house, he had ended up flat on his back in hospital for weeks. Further months on sick leave while he had waited for his neck and shoulder to heal, followed by reconstructive surgery for his shoulder, had added to his frustration. By the time he had been fit for duty again, the case had been closed.
He was no longer a detective, but he had not dropped the case. Thanks to bequests from his grandparents and a talent for investment, Marc was independently wealthy. Enough so that he had been able to buy in to the security business he presently co-owned and could afford to fund an ongoing private investigation into the case.
When he had finally woken up from sedation in hospital to find that both Natalie and Jared had died, grief and cold fury hit him like a blow. Despite the gloomy prognosis on his fractured neck, he had made a vow.
It was too late to save his family, but he would use his talent for solving crime, which had resulted in their deaths, to bring the man he was certain had murdered them to justice.
He hadn’t made a significant breakthrough in the six years he had chased leads and walked down investigative dead alleys. But the murderer who was taunting him would make a mistake, and when he did Marc would be waiting.
It was just a matter of time.
Chapter 2
An hour before midnight, and the anniversary of Natalie’s death.
Jenna walked through the darkened parking lot of the shopping mall in central Auckland, glad for the casual warmth of jeans and boots and the cashmere coat belted around her waist to push back the chill.
Overhead, thick clouds hid any hint of moon or stars. On the ground, streamers of cold mist rose off damp concrete and wreathed ranks of wet, glistening cars, adding a dismal air to a chilly winter’s night.
Behind her, footsteps echoed, the tread uncannily mirroring her own so that at first she had thought the step was just an echo.
Adjusting her grip on the carrier bags, which thumped against her legs with every step, she walked a little faster, although speeding up was an effort. She was tired from a string of late nights and too many hours spent at her computer. From the scratchiness at the back of her throat and the sensitivity of her eyes, she suspected she was also coming down with a virus. The diagnosis was further confirmed by the chills that periodically swept her and the aches and pains that seemed to have sunk into her bones.
She strained to listen behind her and logged the moment the change in her pace put whoever was following her out of sync with her step.
Automatically, her too-fertile writer’s brain analysed the tread. There was no sharp tap of heels. The sound was more deliberate, solid, so it was likely the person wasn’t female. He was probably one of the young guys she had seen hanging at the entrance to the mall on her way out.
Now that she knew there was definitely someone behind her, the fact that he hadn’t either veered off, or walked briskly past, but had chosen to remain approximately the same distance behind and maintain her snail’s pace sent a chill shooting down her spine. The farther she walked away from the lights of the mall, the more sinister the trailing footsteps had become.
As she approached an SUV, in an effort to catch a glimpse of whoever was behind her, she slowed and glanced in the wing mirror.
Apart from wet cars and dark, thin air wreathed with mist, as far back as she could see, the parking lot appeared to be empty.
In that same instant, she registered that the footsteps had stopped. Somehow that was more frightening than if she had actually caught a glimpse of whoever had been following her.
Heart pounding, she swung around and skimmed the rows of cars. The background hum of city traffic, the distant blare of a car horn, seemed to increase the sense of isolation in the misty parking lot, the muffling, encapsulating silence.
Somewhere off to the left a car engine coughed to life. She let out a relieved breath. Mystery solved. Whoever had been behind her must have stopped to unlock their car just seconds before she had gotten up the courage to check on him.
Castigating herself for the paranoia that had leaped at her from nowhere, she adjusted her grip on the carrier bags, and continued on toward her car.
She had parked on the far side of the lot, next to the clothing department stores, because when she’d made the decision to do some late night shopping, she hadn’t originally counted on buying groceries. Her goal had simply been to get out of her house, away from her office and the memories that, at this time of year, always seemed to press in on her.
Normally a dedicated shopper, happy to price and compare until she found exactly what she wanted, she’d found the items she’d needed too quickly. Unwilling to leave the bright cheerfulness of the mall and the simple human comfort of being amongst people, even if no one bothered to speak to her unless she handed money over a counter, she’d strolled on into the supermarket.
Shopping this late was ridiculous; the task could have waited until morning. But tomorrow was the anniversary of her cousin Natalie’s death and she hadn’t wanted to do anything as frivolous as buy pretty clothes. Especially since her aunt and uncle, who still struggled with their grief, expected her over for dinner.
Behind her, she could hear the car her “stalker” had climbed into accelerating toward the exit, going too fast. She caught a glimpse of a glossy, black sedan, pumped up at the back, and the flare of taillights as he braked. It occurred to her that the car, an Audi, looked like the same model the villain had used in her latest book, which seemed appropriate.
Annoyance at the casual cruelty of the man, if he really had been trying to scare her, replaced the last wimpy remnants of fear. She didn’t normally wish bad things on people, but a sudden, vivid fantasy of the Audi being pulled over and the driver being issued with an offence notice was warming.
Feeling a whole lot more cheerful, she angled across the lot toward her car.
Ahead, a noisy group of young people exited the mall and stopped right next to the shiny new Porsche she had bought to celebrate the release of her book. She saw with relief that they were trailed by a uniformed mall security guard who was keeping an eye on them.
Simultaneously she registered that the obnoxious Audi, which had apparently missed the exit ramp, was now doing another circuit of the lot. Distracted by the kids milling around her car, she sped up. As she did so, she automatically hitched the carrier bags higher and in that instant one of the handles broke and the contents of the bag cascaded onto the pavement.
Staggering a little at the sudden release of weight on one side and muttering beneath her breath, Jenna set the bags down. Luckily the bag that had broken had been filled with packets and cans, not fruits and vegetables. One eye on the kids, who were still grouped around her Porsche, she started retrieving cans, some of which had skittered across the lane.
As she bent to pick up a packet of rice, the throaty sound of an engine caused her to jerk her head up. Twin headlights pinned her. Adrenaline shoved through her veins, momentarily freezing her in place. The black car, which she had momentarily forgotten, was roaring straight for her.
Dropping the rice and cans, she flung herself into a gap between two cars, hitting the wet concrete of the parking lot a split second before
