by Leslie Wolfe
He didn’t budge. There wasn’t a flicker of understanding in the man’s cold eyes. “I can’t,” he replied with what seemed like an indifferent shrug. “You know I can’t. This has to happen, and you know it.” A lopsided grin stretched his lips for a brief moment. “That’s why you’re still here; that’s why you haven’t left. It’s her… her power pulling you back, holding you here. It has to be done.”
Cheryl looked around for something she could use, a weapon, anything. By her side, on the counter, the knife block was within her reach. She lunged for a knife, but she wasn’t fast enough.
He was faster.
She felt the blade ripping through her abdomen like a steel fist. She gasped and tried to scream, but no sound came off her lips. As she fell, she heard the knife drop to the ground, clattering on the kitchen floor by her side.
As her world was starting to turn dark, she saw the man pounce and grab Julie. Her baby screamed and called for her, kicking and writhing with all her might. Then the sound of a blow, and Julie falling, quiet and inert in the man’s strong grip.
Then there was silence, darkness descending over Cheryl’s mind, thick, impenetrable, although she fought it with every drop of life still coursing through her veins.
From the top of the stairs, Heather called with a quivering voice. “Mommy?”
No one answered.
2
A Rainy Morning
Detective Kay Sharp rushed barefoot across the kitchen, too sleepy to feel the cold floor under her toes. Her long blonde hair hung in loose strands over her face, resisting her attempts to keep it in place with one hand. The chilly air seeded goosebumps on her skin, but she ignored them and filled the coffee pot with water. She poured it quickly, then added a new filter and a few scoops of freshly ground coffee before pressing the button.
The machine chimed to life.
Satisfied, she leaned against the counter and inhaled the aroma. It dissipated the fog engulfing her brain and injected some zest into her body, although a touch of migraine still threatened her morning. Squinting in the gloomy light coming through the window from the overcast sky that had been pouring rain all the week, she asked herself the question she’d been avoiding since her alarm had gone off, blaring louder than a siren.
Was she a little hungover?
A smile crept up on her as she recalled last night’s dinner. Detective Elliot Young, her partner since she’d joined Mount Chester Sheriff’s Office, had been seated across the table from her, barely saying a word over the excellent, medium-rare steak and too much beer that went with it. She remembered ordering another and another, but the truth was she’d drank all that brew because she didn’t want to call it a night.
Not yet.
Not while his blue eyes were looking at her like that, saying more than he’d ever let himself be caught actually saying. Not while she hadn’t made up her mind about him.
Or was all that in her imagination? Even if it wasn’t, wouldn’t it be better for her to ignore everything and avoid the ultimate professional mistake, getting involved with another cop?
Kay’s eyes shifted to the badge and gun she’d left on the counter the night before when she’d been too tired to lock them up in the usual drawer. Her brother, Jacob, knew the rules and would’ve never touched her stuff.
Seeing that seven-point gold star made her chest swell, eagerly anticipating the start of her shift. But that had less to do with police work and more with her partner. Maybe. Although she loved the work and couldn’t see herself doing anything else other than law enforcement.
She chuckled quietly. “Some shrink you are,” she muttered to herself, still smiling. “Can’t see what’s staring you right in the face.”
About a year ago, she had returned home to Mount Chester, leaving behind a career as an FBI profiler assigned to the San Francisco regional office. She’d traded all that for being a detective in the small town she had grown up in and living with her brother in a house loaded with grim memories.
Good thing the man slept like a log, because she’d rushed to start the coffee pot in the T-shirt and panties she’d worn to bed last night. She wanted to take one sip before hurrying into the shower, knowing she’d barely have time to wash her hair before Elliot was supposed to pick her up.
Elliot.
Him again, at the center of her thoughts, like most days. Driving her to and from work as if she didn’t have her own vehicle. Did that mean—
A noise caught her attention, and she froze. The door to her brother’s bedroom was ajar, slowly opening. She frowned and stepped behind the kitchen island, hiding her naked legs, getting ready to greet Jacob. Hopefully, he’d just wobble through on his way to the bathroom, and she could bolt out of the kitchen before he noticed her state of undress.
The door opened quietly, and a young woman emerged, her hair tousled, running in auburn, messy strands over the collar of Jacob’s plaid shirt that barely covered her butt. Her back toward Kay, she squeezed the door handle gently, closing it without a sound, then turned and froze the moment she laid eyes on Kay.
“Oh,” she whispered, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment. She gathered the shirt around her slender body and stepped in place, unsure what to do.
“Coffee?” Kay asked, holding the pot in the air.
She nodded a couple of times nervously, then replied in a soft-spoken, choked voice, “Yes, please.” She kept the shirt tightly closed around her chest with one hand while the other tugged at the hem.
Kay bit her lip and hid her smile as she turned around to pull a mug from the cabinet. Her little brother had a girlfriend. Nice. He deserved to be happy. She filled the mug and handed it over. Here you go, um—? The unspoken question hung in the air, filled with the girl’s embarrassment thick as San Francisco morning fog as she took the cup from Kay’s hand.
“Lynn,” she finally said, her hand stuck in midair holding the mug. She eventually decided to set it down on the island, her unburdened hand immediately tasked with tugging at the hem of Jacob’s shirt. “You’re his sister, right? The cop?” she added, shooting Kay’s badge and weapon a side glance.
Instinctively, Kay took a step to come between the girl and her gun. She didn’t reply immediately, her eyes riveted on the back of Lynn’s hand. At the root of her thumb, she had a small tattoo, five little dots arranged as they normally show on the five side of a die. The girl had done some time in her life; that was a prison tat.
“I believe it’s time for you to leave,” Kay said coldly. “I’ll wait.”
Turning pale, Lynn rushed back into Jacob’s bedroom, closing the door behind her with a loud thud. A few minutes later, she emerged fully dressed and bolted through the door, avoiding Kay’s glance and Jacob’s questions.
“What’s got into you?” Jacob shouted after her from his bedroom, but Lynn had already left.
Oh, crap, Kay thought, warily anticipating the conversation that was about to begin.
Jacob came into the kitchen, scratching the roots of his thinning tufts of hair, squinting under the dim light as if he’d been the one drinking too many beers at the Hilltop the night before. He wore a sleeveless shirt and striped pajama pants, wrinkled and sweaty.
“Why’d you scare her off?” he asked. “What’s she done to you?”
Kay breathed, decided to stay calm.
“She’s got a record, Jacob. Where did you find her?”
He scratched his belly, his fingers pulling at the shirt, lifting it up until he could run his fingernails across his skin.
“How do you know she’s got a record? You just met her!”
“That tattoo on her hand, the five dots? That’s prison ink. Each dot represents one of the four walls of a prison cell, and the center dot represents the inmate.”
He shrugged, halfway turned from her. “I’ve been in jail too, and I have done nothing to deserve the time I served. In case you forgot.”
Kay raised her hands in a pacifying gesture, already missing the coffee cu
p she’d abandoned on the counter. “Yes, I know that, but this is different.”
He shook his head and pursed his lips. Walking past her, he opened the fridge, not giving her attire a single moment’s attention, then pulled out a sausage from a pack of franks she’d bought the other day. “Want some?” he asked, and she shook her head. He bit into it and chewed loudly, with his mouth open. When her brother was upset, he ate. Even if that meant eating uncooked franks straight from the deli pack.
“I’ve seen this kind of tat in—” she started to say, but he silenced her with a hand gesture.
Thrusting his chin forward, he turned to face her, then swallowed the remnants of sausage half-chewed. “Listen, sis, I’m not the catch of the century, if you get my drift. I work seasonal jobs when I can find them and live with my sister, for crying out loud. To make things worse, my sister’s a cop, and the entire town knows she had to yank my ass out of the joint.”
“But you were innocent—”
“How many people do you think actually believe that? Huh? I think most of them think you pulled some strings to make my record go away just because you’re a cop and can get your way. So, pardon me if I don’t give a shit if Lynn has done time.” He wiped his mouth angrily with the back of his hand. “I don’t think she did, though. She would’ve told me.”
“Really?” Kay blurted, immediately regretting it. She didn’t want to upset her brother. It was her job, the people she dealt with every day, that made her see the world a certain way, every person a possible felon, a liar, a cheater, a thief, maybe even a killer.
Jacob sighed, his eyes clouded by sadness and resignation. “Yeah, really. I’m not a complete moron, you know. I can tell when someone’s truthful with me.”
She lowered her eyes. Jacob was an adult who’d been living on his own until she’d returned to Mount Chester after having been gone for eleven years. He was more than capable of taking care of himself, and she was his sister, not his mother. Their history together, the rough times they’d shared growing up, had made her overprotective. He was the only family she had left. “I’m sorry, little brother,” she said, touching his arm gently. “I’ll get off your case, permanently.”
“And that’s a promise?” he asked, grinning like a cat who’d just opened the cream jar.
“It’s a promise,” she replied quickly. “I wish you both the best that romance has to offer,” she added, still planning to run the girl’s background as soon as she got to the office.
A car pulled into the driveway, crunching pebbles under its wheels. Kay looked out the window and recognized Elliot’s unmarked Ford Interceptor. “Shit,” she muttered, rushing into her bedroom.
“Speaking of bad decisions,” Jacob laughed, “when are you going to make this Texan a happy man, sis?”
“Ugh, butt out, will you? We’re just partners,” she replied, putting on deodorant in a hurry, then sliding a turtleneck on while rummaging through her closet for a pair of clean, pressed slacks. “We work together, that’s all.”
“Sure, you are,” Jacob said mockingly as the doorbell rang. He opened the door, inviting Elliot in.
As she emerged from the bedroom a few moments later, she looked neat and ready to start another day, her hair tied in a ponytail with a clip, her makeup simple, and only the faintest hint of perfume around her like morning ocean mist. There wasn’t a shred of evidence to the drama that had transpired in their kitchen or to the absence of her planned shower.
When he saw her, Elliot bowed his head and lifted two fingers to the rim of his wide-brimmed hat, hiding the sparkle in his blue eyes for a moment, just as she tried to contain her smile.
Then her phone rang. She picked it up, and her smile vanished, leaving behind a deep frown that persisted after she ended the call. Taking another sip of coffee, she grabbed her weapon, tucking it in her belt.
“They found a body in Angel Creek.”
3
Crime Scene
Not much was said between Kay and Elliot on the drive over to Angel Creek. Another murder in their small, peaceful community was a dark cloud adding to the ones shedding rain incessantly. The wipers whirred rhythmically, filling the silence, encouraging Kay’s mind to wander.
Elliot veered a little to the right to pass the Angel Creek Pointe landmark, welcoming them into the neighborhood. It was one of the most recent ones, built only a few years before Kay’s return to her hometown. The houses were brick bungalows, detached, on half-acre, wooded lots. Looking at the deserted streets, you couldn’t tell that one of the community’s residents had been found dead that very morning.
The loud clicking of the SUV’s turn signal brought her back to reality. They approached the address, and Elliot was about to turn right on the small street already crowded with police cars, an ambulance, and the coroner’s van.
A few people were gathered across the street, huddled tightly under touching umbrellas that could barely withstand the strong winds and pouring rain. Yet they didn’t give up, closing ranks as if the proximity of one’s neighbors increased their own chances of survival when a deadly predator lurked nearby.
“Go home, people, there’s nothing to see here,” she muttered, but only Elliot heard her words.
“They won’t,” he replied, pulling as close to the house cordoned with yellow do-not-cross tape as he could. “I never understood people’s morbid curiosity, but it’s the same in California just as it was in Texas.”
“It’s instinct.” She grabbed her umbrella from the floor where it had dripped on the way there. “Back in the day, before news media and the internet, gossip used to be the primordial form of information as herd safety measure, and closing ranks with one’s peers increases one’s chances of survival regardless of species.”
As he brought the SUV to a stop, his brief grin exposed two rows of perfectly white teeth. “Well, if you put it like that.”
She’d already stepped into the pouring rain, where the wind took about two seconds to turn her umbrella inside out. Grunting, she lowered her head, and rushed toward the front door. Once she found herself under cover of the porch, she abandoned the damaged umbrella and stomped her feet to rid herself of the water dripping from her boots.
“That won’t be enough this time,” Dr. Whitmore said, rushing from his van and meeting her by the door. “I’ll give you both coveralls and booties.” He beckoned his assistant, who readily shared two sets of sealed plastic pouches and a third for the doctor himself.
Kay studied the man’s face as he ripped through the wrapping and extracted a disposable coverall that he slipped over his clothing. He looked grim, the ridges on his forehead deeper than she’d seen at the crime scenes they’d worked together in the past. They went way back, their professional relationship dating from before he’d semiretired to Mount Chester, and she’d joined the local sheriff’s office. They had shared seven years of crime scenes in San Francisco when she was still a special agent and a profiler with the FBI, fresh out of college, and he was the chief medical examiner for San Francisco County.
“What’s it like in there?” she asked, leaning against the porch rail to lift her foot and slip the shoe protectors over her boot.
“I just got here,” Dr. Whitmore replied. “Brace yourself; this one’s a doozy from what I heard from first on the scene. The victim is Cheryl Coleman, former married name Montgomery, thirty-five, a dental hygienist and widowed mother of three. Two of the girls are missing, per the neighbor who discovered the body. That’s him, over there.” Doc Whitmore pointed at a middle-age man shivering under a blanket in the back of the ambulance. “County’s bringing everyone in to help with the search.” He pulled the coverall’s hood up over his head and tightened the string snugly around his face.
Knotted muscles lined Elliot’s clenched jaws. Kay sighed and swallowed an oath as she put on the coveralls. They were about to enter a crime scene in severe weather. The risk of forensic contamination increased dramatically with every drop of rainwater. Kay followed s
uit and tightened her hood, capturing her soaked hair underneath it. She already felt as if she’d entered a sauna, and it was going to be a while until she could take off the suit.
“Ready?” Dr. Whitmore asked, giving them both a good look over before he opened the door and stepped inside.
The first thing Kay noticed as she entered the house was the smell of stew. It was probably going to be a while before she could have a serving without thinking of that crime scene.
Doc led the way to the kitchen as if following the strong scent. Halfway through the hallway, her nostrils picked up another scent, heavier, metallic, the smell of blood.
She almost bumped against Dr. Whitmore’s broad back. He’d stopped abruptly at the end of the hallway, muttering an oath. Then he stepped to the side, making room for her and Elliot to approach.
Her heart pounded as she took in the scene, her stomach twisted into a knot. A woman lay curled on her side in a congealed pool of blood, still holding her abdomen with one livid hand. Burgundy traces of dried blood rivulets wove patterns on her frozen fingers, where she’d kept pressure on her wound to no avail. Her chestnut hair, long and shiny, fanned around her head, moving gently when the breeze made it through the door. Her eyes, still open, stared at the back entrance, and her other hand stretched out in the same direction in a pleading gesture. Her lips, bluish pale under the rosy lip gloss, were parted as if to whisper one last word, to draw one last breath.
A little girl, not more than three or four years old, pale as a sheet, lay inert against her mother’s body. Her head was resting on her mother’s arm, her thumb wedged firmly in her mouth. One of her pigtails had come loose, and a green elastic tie was on the floor by her side. Loose strands of hair covered part of her tear-stained face, auburn curls entangled and caked in blood. Inches away from her head, a sizeable fileting knife was abandoned on the floor, probably dropped by the murderer right after he’d stabbed her mother.
Kay’s heart froze. Oh, no, she thought, her eyes searching for a breath, an eye movement, anything.