Fire Point Read Online Free PDF Page A

tell you?’
    Lock’s eyes flicked to the rearview mirror and the black BMW sedan that had been following them since they’d left the hotel. He glanced at his partner. ‘It’s more what she didn’t say than what she did.’
     

13
     
    Lock pulled in behind Tarian’s Mercedes as she talked to the lone security guard manning the entrance to the apartment complex. Every non-resident visitor had to be signed in. They had to give details of who they were, and whom they were there to see. Their vehicle details were recorded too.
    Thirty seconds later it was Lock’s turn. The security guard was Hispanic, in his late forties, with an easy smile and a professional manner. It was a feature of Marina Del Rey that if you saw someone who wasn’t white they were likely working rather than living there. Lock nudged the Audi past him and followed the Mercedes past a series of boat docks and jetties. The BMW had fallen away.
    The Mercedes turned right, and disappeared down a ramp into an underground parking lot. Lock followed, pulling into a visitor’s spot as Tarian got out.
    He and Ty walked her to the elevator. ‘Does your son know we’re coming?’ he asked.
    ‘I called ahead to tell him,’ she answered.
    ‘And what did you say about who we are and why we’re here?’
    She snapped off her sunglasses as the elevator doors opened. ‘He knows who you are, but I said the family’d had some kidnapping threats and that you were here to talk about that.’
    Lock didn’t like it. He wasn’t opposed to telling a white lie once in a while, but in general he believed in being honest with people. For a start, the truth was a whole lot easier to remember. And if Marcus had issues, trust would be key. Lying to a volatile person meant you were taking a risk.
    He put a hand across the elevator door, preventing it from closing. Tarian had already stepped inside and was waiting for him and Ty.
    ‘That’s not gonna do it. You tell your son the truth or we’re out of here,’ he said to her.
    She looked like she was about to argue, but decided against it. Her eyes narrowed. ‘I’ll tell him I’m worried about him, and you’re here to make sure he stays safe. How about that?’
    Lock let the door go and stepped into the elevator with Ty. Tarian hit the button for the third floor. The doors closed.
    ‘And the kidnapping threats?’ Ty asked. ‘You already mentioned those, correct?’
    ‘A family like ours always has some level of threat.’
    ‘Okay, that works. But from now on in, the truth?’ said Lock.
    ‘Absolutely,’ said Tarian, as the elevator stopped, the doors opened ‒ and somewhere down the corridor a gunshot rang out from behind an apartment door.

14
     
    For a woman wearing heels, Tarian Griffiths could run. She sprinted down the corridor toward her son’s apartment.
    ‘Which one’s he in?’ Lock shouted, as he raced to catch up with her. Ty was already out in front of both of them, his SIG Sauer 226 drawn, his broad chest providing Tarian with body cover.
    The reverb of the gunshot had faded. Lock counted off seven doors down this stretch of corridors.
    ‘Which number?’ he demanded again.
    ‘Seven. Three zero seven,’ Tarian said
    Lock counted off the numbers: 307 was the apartment at the very end. He stepped level with Tarian and grabbed her wrist.
    So far, what he knew didn’t point to anything good being behind the door. Marcus was, at best, emotionally volatile. He knew his mother was on her way up to see him, and for all Lock knew, he might have figured out that she wasn’t alone. If he was in a paranoid state and had seen his mom arriving with two heavy-built men, he might have put two and two together and come up with five. Maybe he’d decided it was some kind of tough-love intervention that would end with an injection and a strait-jacket.
    More worrying was that they had heard a lone gunshot. Then silence.
    If Marcus had just taken his own life, Lock didn’t want Tarian walking in on it,