by Style, Linda
The little boy looked so much like the man in the photo, and the man looked so much like Rob, it was uncanny. And the man was smiling. This man was happy with his family. Very happy. So, it couldn’t be Rob.
Yet nothing…absolutely nothing in the photos said definitively, this is not Rob.
She was about to set the photo down when she noticed a sliver of something on the man’s arm just below the line where his short sleeves ended. Was it? A shiver of knowing crawled up her spine. Heart pounding, she glanced at the man’s other arm. The sleeve edge. Relief flooded her limbs. It was just the sleeve edge. That’s all it was.
Ramsey was saying something to her, but suddenly she couldn’t hear a word over the roaring in her ears. She pulled herself ramrod straight and slapped the photo down on the table in front of her.
“Well, that served no purpose.” She glanced at her watch. “And I’d better leave now or I’m going to be late.”
She shoved to her feet, and the chair scraped noisily against the wood floorboards as she pushed it back, her legs as wobbly as noodles.
“Thank you for meeting me, Detective Ramsey.”
And with that, she turned and fled.
***
Monday morning, back in L.A. at the house, Ramsey nudged open the Special Investigations unit door with one foot, then shouldered it the rest of the way. He crossed to his desk and set down the coffee and the egg-and-cheese-filled tacquito he’d picked up for breakfast on the way to work, then circled the desk to sit.
“Any luck?” Sam Houston, also known as Tex, asked from his corner of the room.
“Me, have luck?” Adam responded around a mouthful of tacquito. “How’re you doin’, Tex?”
“Good as can be expected.” Tex waited a second before he added, “Considerin’.”
Tex wasn’t fond of his current gig—working on a cold case.
“Yo.” Rico Santini charged into the room, his face lit up as if he’d just been promoted. “Wait till you see this.”
He dumped a pile of papers on Adam’s desk, nearly spilling the coffee. “Hey, kid, take it easy. That’s my lifeline.” Adam rescued his coffee and cuffed Rico on the shoulder. “Your enthusiasm so early in the morning isn’t shared by everyone.”
Tex grunted in agreement. “Some of us take a little longer to get started.”
At fifty-five, Houston was the oldest detective in their unit. Adam fell in the middle at thirty-five, as did Jordan St. James and Luke Coltrane. Rico Santini, a mere twenty-seven, was the baby.
“Where’s everyone?” Adam asked, nodding toward Jordan and Luke’s empty desks.
“DB near the bus station.”
Jordan and Luke had been partners for only a short time and were such total opposites, the old timers had taken bets on how long it would take before one asked for a new partner or a transfer. But, so far, the two seemed to get along better than anyone in the unit. Surprised the hell out of Adam.
“And the captain?”
“Some big meeting with Chief MacGuire.”
Adam doused his breakfast with more hot sauce, stuffed the rest of the tortilla into his mouth and washed it down with scalding coffee. He picked up one of the papers Santini had dropped on him.
“What am I looking for?”
The kid’s dark eyes shone as he rolled his chair to Adam’s desk. “You tell me. That’s the whole purpose of this.”
No rush on getting this stuff back? The Sullivan case was nearly five years old, and he doubted anything he read would require quick action on his part. After he got the body exhumed, and if the information turned out as he suspected, then there might be a need for speed.
“Nope. It’s old stuff,” Rico said, then shoved off to roll back to his own desk.
A rogue thought sideswiped Adam. If the guy in the photo turned out to be Sullivan, how would the “widow” react? Stupid thought. He knew from what she’d said, the guy all but walked on water.
He didn’t know what it was like to have a woman feel that way about him. Not even when he’d been married. A twinge of envy surprised him…but only for a moment. He knew better than to wish for the impossible. He wasn’t cut out for marriage. It didn’t work when you couldn’t pay as much attention to your partner as your job. And he loved his job. His ex had been right when she’d said he didn’t love her enough.
What really frosted him was how the Sullivan woman idolized her supposedly dead husband and didn’t see what a scumbag he was. But he’d seen it over and over, women defending men who treated them like shit. Women who were duped into believing the treatment they got was somehow their fault.
He didn’t see Jillian Sullivan as one of them, though. That was the rub. Hell, he didn’t know if the guy was dead or alive, didn’t know if the man’s wife knew something or nothing.
And the only place he was going to see Jillian Sullivan again was in court. So, why was he even thinking about her?
Adam continued shuffling through the papers, but his thoughts kept returning to the lady in red. It was obvious she liked the color, since every time he’d seen her, she’d worn something red. Even her car was red. But what he remembered most was the dress…which was stamped indelibly in his mind. Even now, he could see her walking toward him, her hips swaying seductively…music playing in the background.
“Yo. You joining a band, Ringo, or is that pen workin’ a beat on its own?” Rico said, laughing.
Adam glanced at the pen in his hand, stuck it in the holder on his desk. “Just thinking.”
About how did a class act like Jillian Sullivan got mixed up with a guy like her maybe-not-dead husband? To be fair, he had no real proof that Jack Sullivan was involved in anything.
Yet.
It was still just a hunch, mostly because the sting Bryce had been working on was so sensitive, so high profile, even their own guys weren’t in on it. But since he’d been back on track, he’d pieced together enough information to know that the project involved SWBI—the Southwest Border Initiative—created to crack down on drugs coming into the U.S. from Mexico. What Bryce’s part was, he didn’t know, other than he’d been deep undercover.
The photos Adam had received, which had come with a letter, were like manna from heaven, giving him the evidence he needed to move forward. All he needed now was for his vacation request to go through and for Gina, the unit’s administrative assistant, to type out the “gun letter” he’d sweet-talked her into doing for him. He might need it while he was traveling to prove he was a cop and that it was okay for him to carry in places guns weren’t allowed.
Once all that was nailed down, he’d be on a plane to Costa Rica.
He went back to the files on the Sullivan case and didn’t emerge until he’d read every word.
He didn’t like the way the case stacked up.
Jillian Sullivan had been right that he hadn’t checked her out before he’d headed to Chicago.
After receiving the letter and the photos, he’d punched up Sullivan on the computer and, discovering the connection, had run the backgrounder on Jillian. But he was too eager to get on it to read thoroughly and had only skimmed the file for the basics—where she lived, where she worked, who she hung out with, relatives’ names and addresses, of which there’d been only one, her motherin-law. All the easy stuff.
He read his notes again. There were three strikes against her. Number one—four years ago she’d paid $300,000 cash for her house. Okay. Could’ve been the insurance money. Still, it was a hefty bit of insurance for a truck driver. Number two—she’d started three upscale hair salons after moving to Chicago, and all of them were doing exceptionally well. Number three—she was debt free. How the hell could a person her age manage all that in such a short time?
Either she was one helluva businesswoman or she’d found a pot of gold.
CHAPTER FIVE
JILLIAN RAN A THUMB over the smooth glass on the family photo, her gaze lingering on her husband’s left arm. During their marriage he’d always worn shirt sl
eeves long enough to cover the tattoo. Rob had hated it, said he’d had it done on a lark when he was young and stupid.
She’d never given it a thought. All she cared about was her husband and Chloe, her family. Rob’s looks or his career, or keeping up with the neighbors, had never been important to her.
But Rob had always lamented not being rich enough to give her the things he felt she deserved. Mostly he regretted being “just a truck driver.”
A lump rose to her throat. Ironic that he’d died in his truck.
Still…those photographs! She didn’t know what to believe. Was that man her husband? There was no logical reason to think so. Even if she had seen the sliver of a tattoo on the arm of the man in the photo, she simply couldn’t believe he was her husband. There was no valid reason for her to think it was. And the idea of amnesia was simply too bizarre.
She threw herself across the bed. She’d spent the past two nights trying to decide what to do and still hadn’t come up with anything. How could she prove to herself the man in the photograph wasn’t Rob?
She couldn’t do what Ramsey wanted. Because every time she thought about it, something told her it was very wrong to dig up a man’s final resting place. Harriet would be devastated, and doing it without telling her was the same as lying, which went against Jillian’s personal code of ethics. Doing it for her own peace of mind…maybe.
If there was no other way.
Rolling over, she glanced at the clock. It was 8:00 a.m. and she hadn’t slept more than a few hours all night. Her brain was fried and her nerves felt as if they were going to jump from her skin. She had to do something before she went crazy. Studying Rob in the family photo again, she knew. Of course! All she had to do was see the man in person and she’d know if he was Rob or not. All anyone had to do was locate the person in the detective’s photos.
Did Ramsey plan to do that? Maybe she should call to find out. But it was only 5:00 a.m. in California, and even if he was there, he wouldn’t be at work yet.
Too wired to do nothing, she scrambled off the bed and flew downstairs.
There were agencies that located people. Patti Krakowski, the manager of her first shop and now manager of all three, had been adopted as a baby and had done a search for her biological parents. Maybe the agency Patti had used could locate the guy in the photo if the LAPD couldn’t.
She got out pen and paper and started a list of all possible sources that might be of help. She thought of calling Dana’s husband, Logan, but his company only did high-level top-secret investigations, and she didn’t want to spoil their vacation, anyway. More important, if she could avoid it, she didn’t want Chloe to know anything about this.
Next she went to her computer, got on the Internet and typed in Locate people. Within seconds of hitting Search dozens of sites popped up.
Wow. It looked daunting. She rubbed her eyes and started checking out each site. Before she knew it, it was almost 10:00 a.m.
She punched in Patti’s home number. No answer.
She called the shop. Patti wasn’t there, either. She had to be in transit, so she texted a message to the First Mane Event to tell Patti she’d stop by later to see her.
Adrenaline surged through Jillian’s veins. She had a plan and it felt damn good. Find the man in the photo, identify him, and that would be that.
She grabbed her purse and pulled out Adam’s card. Her hand trembled as she punched in the number.
“Ramsey.”
“Detective Ramsey, this is Jillian Sullivan.”
“Ah, the lady in red.” His voice, a rich baritone, had switched from business formal to familiar. “I tried getting in touch with you earlier, but your line was busy.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No. You seemed upset when you left the other night. I wanted to make sure everything was okay.”
“Your sensitivity training kicking in?”
He laughed. “Something like that.”
His laugh was warm and natural, and it coaxed a laugh out of her. He was probably just doing his job, but his simple act touched her most basic needs—made her realize she’d been alone for a very long time.
How odd to think the one person who’d sparked her interest was the wrong person in every possible way. And he’d made his feelings about home and family perfectly clear. Great. For someone else.
“What’s on your mind?”
“I was wondering what efforts your department plans to make in trying to locate the guy impersonating Rob?”
The line was silent. She wondered if they’d been cut off.
Then he said, “I’m not sure what you’re asking, Jillian.”
“I’m wondering why you don’t just go to this Mirador place and talk to the man in question. Get his fingerprints. Wouldn’t that be all the proof you need?”
More silence. Then he replied, “No. But it might be the proof you need.”
“Excuse me?”
“The LAPD is looking for your husband’s murderer. If there’s an impersonator out there, it only means something to us if the tests show the imposter had something to do with your husband’s death.”
“And if his murderer is the imposter?”
She heard a sigh on the other end of the phone and envisioned Ramsey rubbing the back of his neck, scrubbing a hand across his solid chin. “I’m sorry. We can’t pursue that piece until we have the other information. And even if it turned out the guy in the photo was the murderer and is impersonating your husband, it opens another can of worms altogether. Lots of paperwork and red tape. Not to mention money the department would have to approve.”
“Oh,” she murmured, her spirits sinking lower and lower by the second.
“I have to follow procedure. The first step is to get DNA testing done, which on a cold case, can take months. If I need to get a court order to have the remains exhumed, it’ll take even longer. Sorry to say, it’s not top priority.”
Months? She wanted to know now. It seemed important for her to know now, but she didn’t know why. Even if she agreed to have Rob’s body exhumed, it would take too long. “Isn’t there something else you can do?”
“No. I’m sorry.”
She sighed.
“Is that the only reason you called?”
His voice was husky with meaning. She tried not to think about it, but couldn’t stop her thoughts from going elsewhere. She knew right then why she wanted to know now. She was, as Dana had said, ready. “What other reason would I have?”
“I thought you might have had a change of heart. That maybe you’d decided to give us the okay on exhuming your husband’s body.”
God, she was an idiot.
“If I change my mind, Detective Ramsey, you’ll be the first to know.”
***
“Patti? You around?” Jillian peered into the stockroom at the First Mane Event, renamed after she’d opened the second and third salons. The scents of perm chemicals and peroxide tangled with that of citrus shampoo and hair spray, which always caught in the back of her throat.
Hearing the low-level hum of hair blowers and the voices of a half-dozen stylists chatting with their customers gave Jillian a sense of comfort she hadn’t felt since her so-called vacation started. The shop was home to her, the place she was most comfortable, the most confident.
Three days and she missed work already. She missed Chloe already. In eleven years, they’d not been apart for more than two days.
Patti emerged from behind some shelves in back, and spying Jillian, she stopped in her tracks. “What on earth are you doing here?”
“I just stopped by to chat.”
“And you expect me to believe that? Get real, girlfriend.” Patti sashayed to her station, which was empty at the moment, snatched up a broom and took a few swipes at the locks of hair on the floor.
“So, what’s up with the e-mail guy?” Jillian asked to divert attention from herself.
“We’re cool. More important, I heard you had a hot date with some gor
geous hunk.”
Jillian opened her mouth to protest but Patti shushed her with “Uh-uh-uh-uh! Sherry saw you at Joe Bailly’s on her way to the movies Saturday night. So don’t try to deny it.”
“It wasn’t a date. And the only thing that was hot was the temperature.”
Patti looked at her askance. “Sherry thought otherwise. But date or not, if you make the right moves, who knows what can happen?”
“I don’t make moves, right or otherwise.”
Patti, whose hair this week was such a dark red it was almost purple, peered over the top of her black-framed glasses and gave Jillian a “tsk-tsk, poor-thing” shake of the head. “You gotta get out more, babe. Start flashing the assets. A body like yours needs some action. Start getting laid.”
“Yeah, that’s just what my daughter needs—a sex-crazed mom who’s boinking a different guy every night. Great example to set if I want her to be a hooker by the time she’s twelve.”
“Okay. Okay. Don’t listen. Dry up and don’t say I didn’t try to help.”
Jillian smiled.
“So,” Patti continued right on. “Is there a reason you’re here? Because if it’s just to check us out, I’m insulted. And if it’s not and things are fine, I really don’t want to see your face until your vacation is over.”
“Okay. All right! But first, two things. I need the name of the agency you used to find your birth parents because…a cousin of mine wants to find someone. And second, I wanted to tell you I’m thinking about taking a trip.”
Patti’s mouth fell open, and after a sputter or two, she said, “Well, damn. That’s cool. Where to?”
“I haven’t decided. At first I thought California. I still have some friends there. Then I thought, why not somewhere exotic, like Jamaica, or Cozumel?” Jillian waited a beat, then said, “Costa Rica, maybe.”
Patti’s head snapped up. “You serious?”
She shrugged, grinning, liking the idea more and more. “It’s not that surprising, is it? I mean, you guys are the ones who convinced me I absolutely needed a vacation. Besides, Chloe’s gone for two weeks, so I’m as free as the wind.”