None of that information tied Sabrina to her brother, but there had to be a connection, and she needed to find it, especially now.
She shuddered as the image of Sabrina's shocked gaze ran through her head. One minute she'd been alive, a young, vibrant woman, and now she was dead.
She needed to call the police, report the murder. She should have done it before she left the park, but she'd needed to get out of there. Picking up her own phone, she hesitated. If she came forward as a witness, she'd be painting a target on her back. If she stayed silent, Sabrina's killer would go free, and whatever she'd died trying to expose would stay buried. She needed to be careful.
Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a prepaid phone she sometimes used on her job when talking to people she didn't want to have her real number.
After connecting to 911, she said, "There's been a death at Griffith Park, the remote trail entrance off Crystal Springs Drive. It's a female. She's on the wooden bridge about a quarter mile up the trail."
"Ma'am, can I get your name and?—"
She ended the call, knowing that even if the police traced her number, they wouldn't get to her. And they didn't need to get to her, because she didn't know anything.
That wasn't exactly true. She did know why Sabrina had been in the woods at that location, but she certainly hadn't seen who had shot her with that dart. The police would have to figure that out. In the meantime, she'd do her own investigation into Sabrina and what possible tie she might have had to her brother.
As she drove home, another question nagged at her mind:Why hadn't the shooter gone after her?If Sabrina's death was tied to her brother, then why hadn't the murderer shot her, too? She'd been an easy target, not thinking clearly when she'd run toward Sabrina. Maybe the shooter hadn't known who she was. They might have thought she was just a jogger in the park. They might have left as soon as Sabrina hit the ground.
But it bothered her that the unknown killer might know she'd been there. Even if they didn't know who she was, they might still worry that she'd seen something, that she could be a potential witness, a loose end. They could be following her right now.
Maybe the danger wasn't over. It might be just beginning…
FBI Special Agent Matt Lawson's phone buzzed as he pulled into the parking garage of his apartment building in Santa Monica Thursday evening. He was surprised to see Flynn MacKenzie's name on the screen. He was scheduled to start work for Flynn's elite FBI unit on Monday, and he hadn't expected to hear from anyone before then. In fact, he'd turned off his phone for the last three days, taking a break from life, because he'd been exhausted after working a futile case for the LA field office's white-collar crime division that had yielded nothing close to the results he'd wanted, and had been preemptively shut down by the new director. That frustration was the reason he'd joined Flynn's team. He'd heard from Jason Colter, one of his former coworkers, that the unit was fast, agile, and worked without layers of bureaucracy.
"Flynn?" he asked.
"Sorry to cut into your time off, Matt, but something has come up. Are you in town?" Flynn's voice carried a familiar edge of controlled urgency that meant his quiet Thursday evening was about to become a long night.
"Just pulled into my parking garage. Why?"
"We've got a body in Griffith Park, and this one's got your name on it. Literally."
He tensed. "What do you mean—literally?"
"Victim had your name and number written on a piece of paper in her pocket. Her name is Sabrina Lin, attorney at Adler and Briggs. You know her?"
Matt's mind raced through recent contacts, cases, and interviews. "No. I've never heard of her."
"We need to figure out why she had your contact information and why she's dead. How long until you can get to the scene?"
Matt checked his GPS. "Twenty-five minutes."
"Make it twenty."
As the call ended, he reversed out of his parking space and exited the garage, his mind turning to the deceased woman who'd had his contact information—Sabrina Lin. He couldn't place the name. Nor could he remember having any dealings with her law firm. It was possible she was tied to one of his cases and he just didn't remember her, but he was still rolling her name around in his head when he arrived at the park.
The crime scene was in a remote area, poorly lit, and swarming with police. Matt badged his way past the perimeter tape and found Flynn standing on a wooden bridge next to a body bag.
Flynn MacKenzie looked like he should be teaching surf lessons in Malibu instead of running one of the FBI's most elite units. He wore jeans and a brown jacket, his blond hair on the longer side, his skin tan, his laid-back stance deceptively casual.
Flynn gave him a nod, then unzipped the bag, revealing the face of Sabrina Lin. She was young, probably early thirties, attractive, wearing business attire, with no visible sign of an injury.
"What do we know?" he asked as Flynn zipped up the bag.
"She's a thirty-year-old attorney with Adler and Briggs. Time of death appears to be around seven. A 911 call came in at 7:15. Police found her at 7:26." Flynn paused, then handed him an evidence bag containing what looked like a small dart or needle, no bigger than a toothpick. "This was embedded in her neck, barely visible. My guess is that she was injected with a lethal dose of something."
Matt studied the dart through the clear plastic. "Someone wanted this to look natural—heart attack, stroke, maybe an overdose, if it left a trace of drugs in her system. Clean, quiet, and designed to avoid the attention we're giving it now."
"Exactly. We'll have to wait for the autopsy and tox screen to get the full results, but this was definitely a homicide."
