But in the very depths of her gut, hidden behind the heavy feeling in her chest, she knew her instincts were on point. She had wronged many people in her life, too many to count. Even her parents when she left home that day and spat angered words at them. But there were only ever two enemies of whom she needed to be afraid. And both had just cause and the means to take their revenge.
Propelled by the notion that Myles' murder might very well have been a message of warning to her, she charged out of the kitchen and up into her bedroom. Her mind and body seemed to have taken on a will of their own as she yanked open her closet doors and shoved a rack of clothing to one side. On the floor of her wardrobe stood a small drawer unit and she fought to drag it over to one side. It was heavier than she recalled it being, not having needed to move it since she arrived almost twenty years earlier. She panted as it finally gave way under her strength and she dropped to her knees in front of the space it had occupied. Her fingers moved quickly to pull up one of the corners of the carpet where it had been sliced into a neat square flap. Beneath it, the wooden floor lay exposed and she reached into one of the drawers of the unit to retrieve a flat tool—similar to one a sculptor would use to carve clay. She wedged the flat point between the floorboards. One easily lifted away and she moved to lift the other. Her hand reached down and from the dark corners beneath the floorboards, she retrieved a small duffle bag. The black leather was covered in a thick layer of dust that puffed into a small cloud as she dropped it on the floor beside her. Panic made way for hesitation when she reached for the zipper. Never, after all this time, having remained hidden in the safe confines of St. Ives at the furthermost point of England, did she ever think she'd have to face either of them again. The notion gave her chills, knowing that either of them, if not both, was quite capable of killing her. And why wouldn't they? She had destroyed one's life and robbed from the other.
A lonely tear threatened to run down her cheek. She had come to love her life in St. Ives, and all the people who welcomed her. The last words Myles had said to her were that she was the best thing that had ever happened to them, a blessing. Now, it seemed as if she was the direct opposite. She has cursed this town, brought with her the sins of her past. A past the residents of St. Ives were now paying dearly for.
She vigorously wiped away the tear that had settled on her chin then her fingers moved to pull back the zipper. And as she pulled back her shoulders, resolved to doing what she needed to do to protect the town—and Ewan—she emptied the contents of the bag onto the soft carpet next to her.
Chapter Five
Ewan disappeared back into the police station and stood staring at the space where Jorja had waited for him. His hands pushed the panels of his suit jacket back before they settled on his hips. Something had unnerved her, made her run, made her retreat into her shell. Something had triggered her to run out of the station. He had fought for years to gain her trust but always sensed she was holding out on him. Not even when they tried taking their friendship further did she fully open up to him, and he knew she wanted to, was desperate to surrender all she held cooped up inside. It was as if she couldn't. As if trusting someone would penetrate the protective wall she had built around her.
He walked over to the coffee station; saw where she had spilled half her mug of coffee.
A voice behind him startled him.
"Ah, there you are, sir." PC Bennett had come in from the file room and moved to a desk directly behind Ewan.
"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you, sir." The young police constable dropped a Manila folder on his desk and waited for his superior to respond. When he didn't, he continued talking.
"The first of the crime scene photos came in; they should be there on the printer," he pushed his chin toward the machine next to Ewan. "I've just opened the case file so will start recording what we know so far."
Ewan's eyes lingered on the photos in the machine and instantly knew that was what had scared Jorja. She must have seen them. He snatched the photos from the printing tray, briefly scanned each one, and then handed them to his constable.
"Thanks, make sure no one sees them, Bennett. We cannot leave these things lying around. This is a murder investigation, not a pub brawl."
"Yes, sir, sorry, sir."
Ewan charged into his office, snatched his car keys and cell phone from the desk, then made his way to the exit.
"And make sure every single piece of evidence that comes in is under lock and key, got it?" he shouted over his shoulder as he rushed out.
Once he reached Jorja's house, he parked the car in her driveway then briefly walked round the back of the house to check in with his squad who were still working the crime scene.
"Anything new?" he asked his sergeant, Charlie.
"Not yet, sir. The men are combing the area for evidence, and we're still waiting for forensics to arrive, but we should get a time of death any second now." His eyebrows lifted as his eyes pointed to where the coroner had just inserted a spike into the body.
Ewan stepped closer to the victim's body and waited for the announcement. Please Lord: let it be when she was at Ann's.
"Time of death between midnight and four this morning. Cause of death: a puncture wound to the carotid artery. Most likely from this copper rose. The victim was killed somewhere else then brought here to be discovered. He would have bled out in minutes. There is not enough blood here for this to be where the victim was killed. I'll know more once I examine the body, but I am pretty sure he was brought here."
Ewan rotated in place, scanning the immediate perimeter.
"I don't see any tire tracks."
"Exactly, he was carried here, most likely over someone's shoulder judging by these antemortem bruises that are starting to set in across his abdomen. I would guess about sixty to ninety minutes after he was killed. But, as I said, I'll know more once I inspect the rest of his body."
"Thanks, please keep me posted,” Ewan said and turned to Charlie.
"Send two men to Myles' house to check it out. It might have happened there. Be alert and do not touch anything. Record everything, got it?"
"Copy that, sir."
Ewan turned and walked toward Jorja's house. From the outside, it seemed she was not there. The shutters and curtains were closed. When he reached her front door, he briefly turned to inspect the area behind him, then gently knocked on the door.
Jorja found her mind and body had entered into a state of complete calm as she emptied the contents of the bag onto the floor. It was as if her mind had switched to stealth mode—calm and controlled. Panic and fear had left her and instead, invited laser-sharp focus in their place.
She picked up three bundles of cash, each in a different currency—US dollars, Swiss francs, and Russian rubles. She pushed them to one side and picked up three passports, each matching the country origins of the money. She flipped the first one open with her thumb—United States—and stared down at the picture of the brown-haired woman with black-framed glasses. It was under a different name. She set it down on the carpet and proceeded to the next passport. This time she had long ash-brown hair and bright red lipstick—her Swiss identity. She reached for the last travel document, hesitating as a sudden jolt of nerves hit the pit of her stomach. She thumbed back the cover and took in the photo of the woman with bright red hair that was cropped into spikes atop her head. This was who she’d been when it all happened, when she had risked everything. She looked up at the black leather jacket that hung in the back of her closet—the one she had worn at the time the photo was taken. The one she had always worn back then. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror that was stuck to the inside of the closet door next to her and allowed her eyes to linger over her face. She didn't look anything like any of these women anymore. For one, she had aged at least twenty years, and for another, she had grown her hair out to its natural medium blonde, trimmed into a sophisticated short style that curled in the nape of her neck. Even she would not recognize her now.
&nbs
p; Her attention went back to the contents of the bag, as she dropped the Russian passport on top of the others. There were a set of suction pads, a bottle of talcum powder, a stethoscope, two mobile phones, a pager, and a gun—a SIG Sauer P226 semi-automatic pistol. She moved to pick it up, surprised at the flood of excitement that rushed through her veins when her hand closed around the cold steel grip. With experienced precision, she pulled back the slide release with her other hand to reveal that the chamber was empty. Her thumb moved to eject the full cartridge, briefly checking it before she clipped it back into place, and flicked on the safety.
Interrupted by a knock at her front door, her mind snapped back to the present. She stayed seated on the floor, frozen, listening. The knocking grew louder, this time accompanied by Ewan's voice calling out her name. She knew she couldn't ignore him; he was not one to easily give up.
She gathered the items on the floor and scooped them back inside the leather bag. Everything, except the gun, which she pushed to one side while she hastily dropped the bag back into its place under the floor. Ewan knocked again and she moved quickly to hide the gun under her pillow before racing down the staircase to open the door.
Ewan's eyes darted over and around her shoulders when she opened the door to let him in, checking that she wasn't in any danger.
"I'm alone, Ewan." She turned and started toward her kitchen. He followed.
"Is that it? You are just going to pretend nothing is going on here?" he said as he stood in the entrance to the kitchen while she put on the kettle.
"I don't know what you want me to say, Ewan."
"Well, for a start, why did you run? I told you I needed a statement, but you just upped and left. What's going on, Jorgie?"
She walked to the fridge to grab the milk, bringing it to her nose to sniff if it was fresh. From the kitty door behind them, Vincent made himself known and she poured a few drops of milk into his saucer on the floor.
"Jorgie, please don't ignore me. What's going on? I assume you saw the photos in the printer. You should not have seen them, but still, was it enough to cause you to run off like that?"
"Sorry, it upset me, but I'm fine now.” The tone of her voice was unapproachable.
Ewan shook his head as he moved closer to where she had busied herself with the teabags and stood with her back toward him.
"Yeah well, I'm not fine. I have never pushed you to share anything you might not be comfortable sharing. All these years, Jorgie, I have given you space, proved you could trust me. Heck, even when you put the brakes on our relationship I let it go. But I know you, Jorja Rose. You withdraw when things get too close for comfort for you, too close to what brought you to St. Ives all those years ago. Why? What about Myles Brentwood's murder is making you crawl into your shell, huh? What are you not telling me?"
Chapter Six
Ewan waited, praying she would let him inside her invisible fortress, but instead, she continued making the tea and remained standing with her back toward him.
Ewan softened his tone.
"I know you didn't kill Myles, Jorgie. You couldn't have. He was killed somewhere else and his body was moved here. There's no way you could have picked him up and carried him into that forest, and we know he was carried in because there are no drag marks or tire tracks in the ground anywhere around him."
Again, he waited for her to respond. The new information had brought her some relief. Enough to instantly decide that there was no reason for her to run, at least not yet. She would be on her guard, be careful, wait a little while longer, make sure it was just a random murder that had nothing to do with her past.
She turned to face him.
"So, you believe me now?"
"I never said I didn't believe you, Jorgie. I know you didn't kill him. I just needed your statement, to line it up so no one can point a finger at you."
He moved closer to her, placed his hands on her elbows, and forced her to make eye contact with him.
"Have I ever given you any reason not to trust me, Jorgie? I know you know more than you are telling me. Let me in. I'm on your side, heck I have always been on your side. Whatever battle you're fighting in that pretty head of yours, you don't have to fight alone." He could have continued to tell her God was there too and that the battle was His, but he didn't. He held back.
Ewan's eyes held hers captive, the jade color suddenly looking as alluring as an island ocean. Ewan Reid was a handsome man, and she had never denied that there was a spark between them. She wanted to surrender. Show him who she really was, tell him everything, and accept his help. But she couldn't. Ewan Reid was a man of principle and he wouldn't look at her the same way ever again if he knew who she really was and what she had done before she came to St. Ives. Besides, she had learned a long time ago that no one could be trusted, ever. No one but herself. Letting her guard down now would be a mistake. A mistake their friendship might never recover from not to mention that his life would be at risk, possibly now more than ever.
"I don't know what you're talking about, Ewan. I'm fine, honestly. I shouldn't have looked at the photos. It isn't exactly something I see every day and just caught me off guard, that's all."
She turned to finish making the tea.
"If you ever need to get something off your chest I'm here for you. God is too."
She laughed as she handed him his cup of tea.
"Oh, I very much doubt God would want to help me, trust me. He will take one look at me and walk on by. Not everyone is as holy as you, Ewan."
"Holy? I am far from it, Jorgie. The only things in my life that are holy are my socks."
He waited for his quip to soften her edges. She smiled over the brim of her cup and rolled her eyes at his cheesy humor.
"Great, I have a smile. Now, can I please ask you to pop by the station later to give us that formal statement? I cannot put a foot wrong on this investigation, Jorgie, so I need your cooperation, okay? I'm asking as a friend." His warm friendly eyes pinned hers down again.
"Fine, I'll pop by after I get cleaned up. Speaking of which, how long is he going to lie there?"
"Who?"
"Myles, who else? I can see him from my bedroom window and it's disturbing."
Her words held Ewan's attention as he digested her revelation.
"You can see him from your bedroom window," he repeated.
"Yes, I just said that."
Ewan set his cup down on the nearby counter, turned, and charged upstairs to her window.
"What are you doing? You can't just run into my bedroom."
She had not said that out of modesty, rather concern for him discovering her gun under her pillow. She followed him into her bedroom and found him already standing in front of her window.
She was right, he thought. She could see everything from up there, in great detail.
He turned to face her again, his eyebrows drawn into a frown.
"You didn't hear anything last night? Nothing at all?"
"No, I was sound asleep."
She decided to tell him about Vincent.
"Except—“
"Except what, Jorgie?"
"Well, Vincent seemed to have been disturbed by something in the house."
"What time was that?"
"Around four thirty, I think."
"And you're only telling me this now."
"Yes, I didn't make anything of it at the time, he's a cat. I thought he was just full of beans. But thinking about it now he did seem frightened. He crawled under the spare bed and bolted for the bushes when I left to go on my run."
Ewan was deep in thought as he took it all in.
"Do you think Vincent heard the murderer?"
Ewan turned to look at her, ignoring her question, his eyes suddenly serious.
"How certain are you that there was no one else inside your house when you got up this morning?"
The weight of his question hit her square in the thorax, her face declaring the angst that suddenly engulfed her.
"I-no-I don't know. Why?"
"You said Vincent got scared and ran to hide in the bushes the moment you opened the door. He would not have bolted from the house to hide outside if the danger was out there waiting for him. He would have done the exact opposite if something, or someone, spooked him and the threat was outside. He would have stayed indoors, under the bed, where he was safe."
"You think the guy who murdered Myles was inside my house. While I was asleep? While I got ready for my run?"
"It certainly is possible, and it won't hurt to be sure. I'm going to get a few lads to dust for fingerprints." He was already on his cell phone.
"When, now?" Her eyes darted to her pillow, then her cupboard, noting her door that had sprung open and stood slightly ajar. She had packed her bag in such a hurry that she was now not sure the set of drawers lined up properly with where its weight had left indentations in the carpet and fully concealed the sliced flap.
"Yes, now. Every minute that goes by is one minute closer to the killer disappearing. If my hunch is correct, he was inside your house, Jorgie. Why, I don't know yet, but I can't ignore the notion."
She watched as he peered through the curtain while talking on his cell to his team outside. If they find the duffle bag, or worse, the gun, she would have a lot more to explain.
"Okay, well could I have a few minutes just to freshen up before they come in, please? I'm still a bit sweaty from my run this morning."
Ewan's eyes swept across the room and settled on her en suite bathroom.
"Sure, just make it quick, and try not to touch or disrupt anything too much. I'll have the men start on the doors and windows downstairs."
He turned and left the room, shutting her bedroom door behind him.
Vengeance is Mine: A Jorja Rose Christian Suspense Thriller (Valley of Death Book 1) Page 3