Deadly Impulse

by Carolyn Arnold

  She got up from the sofa and went to her desk. Her apartment was compact and open concept. The front door opened to the kitchen on the left, a small dining table to the right, and the living space behind both. Her office—in the loosest sense of the word—was a desk and a dated computer set up to the side of her living room. But she did have Internet access.

  As she sat down, her wine in one hand, she didn’t know what she was going to do, but she had to draw the man to her somehow. It must have been the haze from the alcohol or her stubborn nature that made her feel she had to do something. She didn’t need to do anything. She knew this in her soul. Constantine would be back without any effort on her part. He was on the No-Fly List, but that wouldn’t stop him from returning to the States. The Russians wouldn’t be satisfied with his freedom. Her investigation into Lexan’s death had upended their organization.

  Her landline rang. She jumped, her wine sloshing over the lip of the glass.

  “Shit.” She licked her fingers and put the glass down. She didn’t really care about leaving a wine stain on the top of the desk. It was a cheap find at a department store.

  “Who is it?” she answered the phone. For this line to ring, it meant someone was downstairs and wanted up.

  “Terry.”

  She hit the button that unlocked the front door, and a couple of minutes later, Terry was in her apartment.

  “How did you make out with the protesters? I left you a voice mail,” she said.

  “I’m here, aren’t I?” He brushed past her, moving farther into her place. “Drinking alone, are we?” He must have noticed the wineglass.

  “Don’t change the subject. What did you find out? Did they know her?”

  “You know it’s not good to drink alone. Some would say only alcoholics drink a—”

  “Terry, so help me God.” She closed the door and then turned to him.

  He was smirking. Good old Terry, who lived to bug her. He really was like the brother she never had.

  He laughed, and she followed his gaze to the bottle on the counter.

  “Do you want some? If you do, I won’t be drinking alone anymore.”

  He dismissed her with a wave of his hand. “I’m not staying long. I just came by to let you know I have a first name. Faye.”

  “And that’s all?”

  “Wow, Terry, that’s awesome. Good work,” he mocked.

  She narrowed her eyes at him.

  “Fine. Be all serious. You know how we were trying to figure out why a woman her age would protest abortion. I have the answer. But I also wanted to let you know that Erik’s alibi has been verified.”

  “All right, now you’re killing me.”

  “Her sister was going to have an abortion, but she didn’t. Apparently she’d been a teen when she got pregnant.”

  “There must be quite the age difference between Faye and her sister. You had mentioned abortion became legal in ’73.”

  He nodded. “Well, in this case, Faye’s parents demanded her sister have an abortion, rather than shipping her off and giving the kid up for adoption.”

  “They were worried about their reputations,” Madison guessed aloud.

  “Most likely. But Faye’s sister ran away and raised the child on her own. She didn’t resurface for years.”

  Madison nodded, understanding perfectly. “Faye’s sister and her child were precious to Faye so she protested for them.”

  “And to make it even more personal,” Terry added, “Faye wasn’t able to have children.”

  -

  Chapter 9

  I CAN’T MOVE MY WRISTS. The smell of blood is up my nose, in my mouth. The shadows looming in the corners shift and transform.

  Anatolli emerges, holding a revolver.

  My heart is beating like a piston, and my breath is labored as I struggle against the restraints.

  He’s coming closer and there’s nothing I can do.

  My head is locked in place, the clasp around my neck limiting my range of motion.

  He’s pulling on my hair, yanking it so hard my vision goes to pinpricks of red with flashes of white.

  “You are going to die.” His spittle mists my face, and he lowers to look me in the eye. But it is no longer Anatolli. It’s Constantine.

  Madison jolted awake and bounded from her bed. Hershey let out a startled bark. He must have been dreaming, too. Madison hoped he’d been running through a field or eating a bone—something peaceful.

  “Sorry, buddy.”

  Hershey stretched out, worming his way to the edge of the mattress.

  She rubbed his fur, waiting for her heartbeat to calm down. “It was a nightmare, that’s all.”

  Was that all? It was so vivid. Her visceral reactions to the images were so real. She knew these men were dead, but Constantine was still alive, out there somewhere. And the simple fact remained that she had upset the Russians and there would be consequences.

  Really, it was surprising that they had let her live as long as they had. Dimitre Petrov must have derived more pleasure from toying with and manipulating her than killing her.

  She sat down on her bed, reality hitting her. The Russians would have tired of playing games. When they came for her next, they would be coming to kill her. Oddly, she found herself hoping they’d torture her first so she could find a window to escape. And if she got the chance, she’d shoot to kill this time.

  Her breathing slowed. But would that be enough? The Russians would just substitute Constantine’s face for that of another hired killer—plenty volunteered their services for blood money.

  And while Constantine was likely out of the country, this left her with another ally of the Russians—the former police chief, Patrick McAlexandar. The fact that he had relinquished his post at the police department and was staying out of the media spotlight these days did little to change her opinion of his guilt.

  -

  Chapter 10

  RICHARDS WAS AT HIS DESK writing notes into a journal but stood when they approached. “First things first. Lividity shows that the deceased—”

  “We know her first name is Faye now.” She hated referring to the murdered as victims or bodies unless there was no other option.

  “The deceased didn’t die in the chair. Lividity starts twenty minutes to three hours after death. The blood pools show she died lying on her side, but rigor set in when she was in the chair.”

  His attachment to using the word deceased confirmed their relationship still hadn’t returned to what it had once been.

  “And the cause of death?” Madison asked.

  “A heart attack. Now, it is possible that certain drugs could have brought it on. I will be requesting a tox panel to see if any of them can be detected. Once we have her ID, we can look at what medications she took and see if any of them interacted. You know I don’t like to play with hypothetical scenarios—that is all your influence—” there was the hint of a smile on his face “—but combining the heart attack with the bruising on her wrists, I wonder if the struggle didn’t bring it on.”

  “Did you find any other evidence that she may have been abused?”

  “Besides the bruising that I believe ties into her death, no. It seems she was otherwise healthy and well nourished.”

  Madison’s gaze drifted across the room to the small woman’s frame on the steel slab.

  Richards walked over and wheeled the remains into a freezer slot.

  Despite all the bodies Madison had seen over her ten years as a cop, it never became easier. There was a fine line between human emotion and objectivity, and it took a lot of willpower to have the latter. It was her training and hardheaded determination to find justice and provide peace to those left behind that kept her going—to make sure the victims’ lives were acknowledged, honored, and respected.

  Richards crossed his arms.
“The sad part is that death is preventable with most heart attacks.”

  “Assuming the struggle brought on the attack, she was left to die,” Terry said. “The other person might not have necessarily meant to kill her. They were fighting, she dropped due to the chest pain, the person panics.”

  “It doesn’t explain why she was placed in a wheelchair and taken to where the protesters hung out,” she said, glancing at Richards, then back to Terry. “There has to be a reason for that. I wonder if abortion tied into the altercation. Someone she loved might have been pregnant and thinking about having an abortion. We already know how adamant and dead set against it she was because of her sister. It’s possible whoever is behind this knew that, too. And for someone believing in a woman’s right to choose, those kinds of conversations often get heated pretty fast. But to the point of leaving her to die?”

  “The person would have had to leave her to get the wheelchair. You can’t premeditate a heart attack,” Terry said.

  Madison conceded with a nod. With rigor setting in about two hours after death, someone had had enough time to get the chair and return to Faye. It led Madison to another theory. “They must’ve made a conscious decision to get the wheelchair, put her in it, and then wheel her into position.”

  Richards exhaled a deep breath. He obviously would have preferred that they take their hypothesizing outside the morgue.

  Terry continued as if he either hadn’t noticed or didn’t care. “I think so, too. The fact that the chair was missing from the hospital tells us it wasn’t signed out; someone simply took it. Do you think they intended to kill her if the heart attack hadn’t happened?”

  Madison shrugged. “We have no way to know that yet.”

  “Either way, the person left Faye’s dead body and then came back after getting the chair,” Terry began. “That takes some balls.”

  “Or stupidity,” she said.

  “Where do you think the altercation took place?” Terry asked.

  “I’m assuming Faye’s house. That’d be the only safe place, really, to leave her dead body without fear of someone discovering it.”

  “The other protesters said she lived near the hospital.”

  “You’re just telling me this now?” Madison crossed her arms. “Did you look up the name Faye in the system? You could narrow the search parameters to show homeowners by that name in a certain radius of the hospital.”

  “No, I—”

  “We’ll have to do that as soon as we leave here.” She paused for a second. Typically this level of incompetence would send her spinning, but Terry was under a lot of pressure. She could see it, so she let it go this time. “So what makes someone confront an older lady about abortion? Assuming, of course, that’s what happened.”

  “No idea. And why not just leave? Someone would find her—Faye—eventually,” Terry said.

  “There would still be an investigation. Along that line, I’d guess wherever she died would show more signs of struggle. We need to find where she lived.”

  Richards cleared his throat. “I might be able to help with that. The victim—Faye,” he said to appease her, as given away by the softness in his features, “had a hip replacement. And from what I can tell it was relatively recent. There—”

  “The nurse from the clinic mentioned not seeing her for a while. She must have been healing from the surgery,” Madison surmised. Richards’s gaze hardened at her for her interruption. “Sorry.”

  “I was going to say that there is a serial number on the hip replacement, and that should lead us to her full name and address.”

  Depending on timing, that may eliminate the need to conduct the database search. “When do you expect to know more?” Madison asked.

  “I’d say within the hour. I made the call upon discovery.”

  She nodded. Thank God for Richards’s competency. How could she have ever doubted his ability, his thoroughness? As that worry lifted, something else settled into the pit of her gut, though: someone had let Faye die.

  -

  Chapter 11

  TERRY WAS GETTING A COFFEE from the bull pen and Madison was at her desk, waiting to hear back on the ID connected to the serial number. She glanced over her shoulder—no sign of Terry—and she brought up Constantine Romanov’s file on her computer and stared at his face. Her heart raced at the image—this time from rage. This man had taken so many lives, probably more than they would ever be aware of. While they didn’t know for sure, she felt pretty certain that he would have returned to his homeland. And if she was right, that meant he’d be reporting to the head of the Russian Mafia—Roman Petrov, Dimitre’s father. And he was a bigger son of a bitch than his son was. His hands were stained red, and his banks were full of blood money.

  “Hey there, Bulldog.”

  She smirked, flicked the monitor off, and turned in the direction of the male voice that was becoming so familiar to her. Troy Matthews stood beside her desk. His green eyes were piercing as he gazed straight into hers. If he had a superpower, it would be his ability to read minds. He wasn’t smiling, but he rarely smiled. It was just his nature. Getting him to show the expression at all was a challenge for her, but every once in a while she was victorious in her efforts.

  “You know how I feel about that nickname,” she said.

  “The other one isn’t appropriate for work.”

  “Would you cut it out?” What he alluded to wasn’t a nickname per se, it was a description: Sexy. “Your nicknames need some work.”

  “Oh.” He placed a hand on his chest, feigning insult. “I don’t have to call you that if you don’t want me to.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “You know I like that one.” And there it was. She couldn’t carry on a conversation with the guy for a minute before she found herself swept up in his charm. Where had her strong, independent spirit gone? She grappled to establish a commanding presence. “I’m working on a case. What’s up?”

  He angled to see her screen. “Top secret I see, and as for the what’s up, it’s probably another loaded conversation not suitable for work.” There was a slight curve to his lips.

  She rose to her feet. He didn’t back up, and they were pressed chest to chest with only about an inch—if that—between them. “You have to stop doing this.”

  “Turning you on?” he whispered, lowering his head until their brows were nearly touching.

  Modesty wasn’t one of the man’s qualities, but that served to make him even more irresistible.

  He placed his hands on her arms, the span of them wrapping around her biceps. Under his touch, she was vulnerable, delicate, female. She rarely experienced those three things, yet he was able to merge them together. It was a heady rush.

  “Are you ready for tomorrow night?” he asked.

  She wanted to forget about tomorrow night. There was a charity event for fallen officers in the line of duty, and it would consist of a four-course dinner and dancing. It was being held in the ballroom of a ritzy hotel where marble floors and arched ceilings came standard. Any cop with a sense of responsibility toward his brethren, which was every one, would be there, or at least would have purchased tickets. In place of the badges and uniforms would be tuxedos and gowns. The thought of wearing a dress swirled nausea deep in her gut. She did her best to avoid occasions that required formal attire.

  “I don’t have anything to wear.” A lie, but if it was based on preference, then she didn’t have a suitable thing in her wardrobe.

  “You’re going to stand me up?” He stepped away from her and moved behind her. “Not a chance. Nope. I’m not allowing it.”

  He had bought the tickets the second they had become available. She had, too, but not with any intention of actually attending. She’d given her tickets to Leland King, a top reporter for the Stiles Times. She had told the man to take a date.

  She glanced over her shoulder at Troy, r
eady to defend her position, but found their faces were next to touching. Again. Damn, the man was smooth. In his maneuvering, he had also positioned himself near the nape of her neck. His breath was whirling a heat storm against her skin, and her gaze traced from his mystical eyes to his lips, then back up.

  “Are you going to say no? To me?” he asked.

  Again with the confidence… If he were any other man, she’d slam the proverbial door in his face. But Troy Matthews had the ability to both empower and weaken her. He lifted her up and grounded her. He possessed her, yet encouraged her independence.

  She sighed. “I’ll go.”

  Troy came around in front of her again. “I’m glad that’s settled. Besides, it will give you a chance to get to know Chief Fletcher.”

  “And why would I—”

  He held a finger to her lips to silence her. Again, any other guy would have gotten his finger broken.

  He continued. “I know you didn’t get along with McAlexandar. He was a chauvinist pig. Fletcher is a woman,” he said.

  “Thanks, I hadn’t noticed,” she said, shaking her head. “But it seems you did.” She raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Someone sounds jealous, but trust me, there’s nothing to worry about.”

  With his statement, she was reminded of how far she’d come. For years, she had allowed and encouraged open relationships. It wasn’t because she wanted the man she was seeing to shack up with other women, but it guarded her heart. No promises made. No promises broken. But with all she had been through, she had changed. Toby may have broken her heart, but that didn’t mean every man after him was him. And as the saying goes, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

  “That’s not what I meant,” she said, trying to back out of him thinking she was jealous.

  There was the subtlest smile on his lips. She watched it dissipate before it was fully born.

  “The way you talk about her, it sounds like you know her quite well.”