Protector's Instinct

by Janie Crouch

  Today that had been dragging his desk and chair back to where they’d once been.

  But the part of him that enjoyed sitting in this chair, the part of him that had missed law enforcement work every day for the past eighteen months since he’d quit, knew that something wasn’t right.

  Donald Brodey’s arrest. His confession. All of it. As much as Zane wanted it to be perfect and tidy, it wasn’t. It just didn’t sit well with him.

  Something wasn’t right.

  Jon walked over and leaned on the corner of the desk. “Looks like they’re carving out a permanent place for you here.”

  Zane leaned back, stretching his legs out in front of him. “Nice of them, I have to admit.”

  “You going to stay?”

  “I think so. It’s not like I have any other job around right now. They’re still picking up pieces of my Cessna in Big Bend.”

  “Not to mention you miss police work.” Jon’s eyebrow rose, daring him to deny it.

  Zane shrugged. “It’s true. I do.”

  “You’re good at it, Zane. Got a natural talent and a good temperament for it.”

  “I know.”

  “Plus, that incredible humbleness.”

  Zane chuckled, but then it faded out. “The only problem is, right now my detective spider senses are telling me there’s something wrong with Donald Brodey.”

  Jon sat at the chair by Zane’s desk. “What about him?”

  Zane shrugged. He wasn’t exactly sure what he meant and didn’t want to bog Jon down if his fears amounted to nothing. “I know you need to go. I don’t want Sherry getting mad at me because I kept the groom away for too long.”

  “I’ve got an hour before I need to leave for my plane. Plus, Sherry is capable of handling anything thrown her way. One of the things I love most about her.”

  Jon and Sherry were a good fit. Partners in every sense of the word.

  “Do you have any wild parties coming up? In your last few days of singlehood?”

  Jon shook his head. “Nah. The guys and I will probably go out for a few beers, but I’m not interested in a strip club or the ‘normal’ bachelor stuff.”

  Zane wasn’t actually surprised. “Oh yeah?”

  “Once you have the one you really want, all of that seems ridiculous, you know? I have no interest in seeing any other naked or partially naked woman besides Sherry.”

  Zane knew what he meant. He wouldn’t go to a strip club now if someone dragged him. It wasn’t what he wanted.

  Caroline was what he wanted. Today. Tomorrow. The rest of their lives.

  Jon leaned back in his chair. “So tell me what you think is going on with Brodey.”

  “I reviewed his case again this morning. From the original B and E.”

  “And?”

  Zane shifted slightly. “Now, with nearly a decade more experience, I’m looking at the arrest in a different light. Brodey claimed his innocence the whole time. Said someone planted his fingerprints at the scene.”

  “Do you believe him?”

  “I believe we caught another burglar six months later and the evidence suggested he’d been placing fingerprints that weren’t his around crime scenes to make himself less of a suspect. I think it’s possible that Brodey was telling the truth. That someone did put his prints on the scene.”

  “Brodey had already been convicted two other times, you know. So it’s not like this was some innocent guy off the street who got thrown in jail.”

  “Actually, that’s what convinced me. I went back through his other case files, cases I wasn’t part of at all, to see if he claimed his innocence then. To see if that was just his MO.”

  “And?”

  “Nope. Served his time, never claimed innocence once.”

  Jon shifted in his chair. “Okay. Then, that just supports his claim that he was out for revenge. That’s why he came after Caroline—to get back at you.”

  Zane picked up a pencil on his desk and began twirling it between his fingers. “That’s what I thought too. That this Damien Freihof guy had just gotten his claws into Brodey and twisted his thinking. And I have to admit, that’s possible.”

  “But something has you questioning it.”

  “Brodey wasn’t ever violent, Jon. All of his crimes involved breaking into houses where no one was home. The man has a family. Kids.”

  “You’re thinking that it’s a pretty big jump to go from a family man with no history of violent crime to kidnapping and attempted murder.”

  “Yes. Exactly. And moreover, I can see why he would still be mad at me. But Caroline? It would take a pretty hardened criminal to kill her for something I did.”

  “People change. Jail hardens them. Then someone like Freihof comes along and pushes them in a certain direction, even one they wouldn’t normally take on their own.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  Wade Ammons walked through the door of the detective section.

  “Hey, Wales, you look pretty good sitting in your old spot. Does that mean you’re going to be staying?”

  “I’m thinking about it. If you guys and the captain really want me back around.”

  The younger man smiled. “We do, believe me. It’s been hard trying to make this place look good all by myself.”

  Jon stood. “I’ve got to move if I’m going to catch my plane. Call me if you need to talk some things through. I’ll also keep searching with Omega resources. Make sure we’re not missing something.”

  Zane shook Jon’s hand. “Thank you, for everything. I guess Caroline and I will be up this weekend to see you get hitched.”

  “See you then.”

  Jon headed out and Zane sat back down at his desk. “Where is everybody, Wade?”

  The detectives’ desks were on the second floor of the building that housed the police department. It was generally more quiet here than all the uniformed officers’ desks and general processing. But it was never this quiet.

  “Huge fire down in the oil district started an hour ago. Most of the station is down helping.”

  “Casualties?”

  “Yeah, a lot. A bunch of office workers got trapped. Caroline’s down there. Last report was that she was directing ambulance traffic to different hospitals.”

  It was a crazier day than she’d expected to go back to, but Zane knew she could handle it. She was probably glad to have such a busy day. Caroline liked to keep focused. She excelled at it.

  “Let me know if you need any help with anything or if I’m needed at the oil district.”

  “Will do. Sounds like the worst of it has passed, though.”

  “I’m going to get Brodey out of holding and talk to him one more time. I feel like we’re missing something.”

  Wade nodded. “We’re gathering everything we know about the last eighteen months of Brodey’s life since he made parole. As soon as the file is ready, I’ll get it to you.”

  Interviewing Brodey again wasn’t hard, since he was still being housed in the temporary cells inside the department until his bail hearing date. But the man was much less cooperative this time. Sullen almost.

  “You still have a right to an attorney, Brodey. You know that,” Zane finally said when Brodey hadn’t given him nearly as open answers as yesterday. “Do you want a lawyer?”

  The man had already signed a confession, so it wouldn’t help much. But it was still his right.

  “Naw. I don’t want no lawyer.”

  “Tell me more about Damien Freihof. How did he contact you?”

  Brodey looked down at his hands. “Freihof called me on the phone. Said he’d been over my case. That he thought you were a crooked cop and that I should take my revenge on you.”

  “I see.”

  “I lost a
lot of years of my life because of you.”

  “You already had two strikes before you even came across my radar. So it’s difficult to believe that you think I’m responsible for all your woes.”

  Brodey just crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, staring at the table.

  Zane decided he needed to take another tack. “But okay. What if I said, looking back at the case now, I can see why you said you were innocent. That I agree with you that someone should’ve looked more closely into your case when we discovered someone was, in fact, planting prints of other criminals.”

  Brodey straightened for just a moment, looking Zane in the eye. “That’s what I told you from the beginning.”

  “And I was wrong, Brodey, I should’ve listened. But I was young. Yours was one of my first solo detective cases. I wanted to make a splashy arrest maybe more than I wanted to make sure justice was served.”

  “You tell my wife that, okay, Wales?” It was the first time Brodey hadn’t seemed dour. Seemed legitimately invested in what he was saying. “You tell her that I wasn’t lying about not being the one who broke into that house.”

  “You’re going away for attempted murder, Brodey. Why the hell will your wife care about a B and E from eight years ago?”

  Brodey seemed to wilt right in front of him. “You’re right, I guess. But if it ever comes up, you tell her that, okay?”

  Zane tried to get more details from Brodey after that. About Freihof, about Big Bend. But the man wasn’t talking.

  “I signed a confession. I don’t have anything more to say.” And that was it. The longer Zane talked, the more silent the older man became.

  Zane got a text from Caroline telling him she would be running late and texted her back. He spent some more time with Brodey trying to get him to spill any more details, but the man obviously was done talking.

  Finally, Zane had him sent back to his cell. He left the interview room with no more information than when he’d started, besides an odd statement about letting Brodey’s wife know he was innocent of a crime that in the greater scheme of things didn’t really matter.

  As promised, Wade had left a file on Zane’s desk about Brodey’s whereabouts and activities since he’d been released from prison. He’d been out for eighteen months, unemployed. He and his wife were separated, but not divorced. She’d stayed with him even when he’d been incarcerated. They had three teenage children.

  Their financial situation was pretty grim, Zane had to admit. The wife and kids were living in a two-bedroom apartment, and they had missed multiple rent payments. Zane didn’t doubt they’d be evicted soon.

  There was only one picture of the family. The youngest, Brodey’s son, seemed to be using some sort of braces in order to walk. Zane grimaced. Medical bills for an illness or disability could cause even further financial hardship.

  He turned the page and everything made more sense for him.

  Two months ago, Donald Brodey had been diagnosed with cancer and had less than six months left to live.

  No wonder Brodey had wanted him to pass along the message to his wife. The way things were going, with his confession, he would probably never see her again. At least would never see her as a free man.

  Maybe Jon was right; maybe finding out he was dying had changed Brodey. Instead of wanting to right any wrongs before he died, he wanted to exact his revenge on Zane. Freihof just happened to contact him at the right time.

  Zane leaned back in his chair, the one in which he’d done his best detective work over the years. There was a big piece of the puzzle he still wasn’t seeing. He knew that with every fiber of his being.

  He just hoped he’d figure it out before disaster struck.

  Chapter Twenty

  Caroline woke up slowly, feeling like she’d had way too much to drink the night before. But she couldn’t remember any drinking.

  And why was she sitting if she was waking up the morning after with a huge hangover? Shouldn’t she be lying in bed?

  She finally pried her eyes open, then immediately closed them again when dizziness and nausea assailed her. She couldn’t help the groan that fell from her lips. She tried to raise her hand to her head to help relieve some of the pressure but found she couldn’t move her arms.

  Then it all came back to her. Not drinking. Drugged. By the sister of the man who had tried to destroy her life.

  “Yeah, that chloral hydrate is a bitch, isn’t it?” Caroline couldn’t tell exactly where the woman’s voice was coming from. She was evidently walking around the chair Caroline was bound to. Not helping the dizziness. “Quick to knock someone out, but a little more difficult to recover from.”

  Caroline felt a sting in her scalp as the woman grabbed her hair and yanked her head back. “But that queasiness? Trust me, that’s the best you’re going to feel all day. It’s just going to get worse from here.”

  “Who are you?” Caroline pushed the words past the dryness of her throat, her voice sounding strange even to her own ears.

  “That’s right, we haven’t formally met, have we? I’m Lisette Trumpold.”

  “Paul Trumpold’s sister.”

  The woman snatched Caroline’s head back by the hair again. “Don’t even say his name.” The woman’s voice was rising in both pitch and volume. She slung Caroline’s head forward. “You ruined his life with your lies. You don’t deserve to say his name.”

  Now it was more than just the drugs that made Caroline want to vomit. After living through the vicious attack by Paul Trumpold, to hear someone defend him—even a family member—made her want to hurl her guts out.

  “I never lied about your brother and what that sick bastard did.”

  The world spun wildly out of control as the back of Lisette’s hand connected with her cheek. If she hadn’t been tied to the chair, she would’ve flown out of it.

  “Liar!” Lisette screamed right in Caroline’s face, spittle flying everywhere. “I’ve seen the truth, the real medical reports, not the ones you and your boyfriend fabricated and gave to the police.”

  Caroline tasted blood in her mouth from where her teeth had scraped the inside of her cheek. She tried to gather her thoughts, figure out exactly what this crazy woman was talking about.

  Caroline breathed deeply, trying to take in as many details as possible. Lisette hadn’t killed her outright at the fire scene, so evidently she wanted Caroline alive for some reason. That was good. Gave her time to figure out some way of escape.

  And she was talking about different medical reports? Caroline had no idea what the hell that meant. Her medical records had definitely been a part of the case against Paul Trumpold, but there had been only one set.

  She needed to figure out exactly what Lisette wanted. Then she could better formulate a plan.

  “Recognize where we are yet?” Lisette asked.

  Caroline forced herself to open her eyes despite the dizziness and nausea it caused. She breathed in and out through her nose, lifting her head and looking around. She knew immediately where she was.

  She was in the house where she’d lived when Trumpold attacked her. On the floor right under the chair that she was tied to right now, he had beaten her into a coma and raped her.

  Caroline could feel the onslaught of panic. Looking at the door just a few feet in front of her, she could easily envision the day she’d opened it just a crack and he’d forced his way through. Could feel the pain—a thousand times worse than the slap Lisette had just given her—as his fist connected with her jaw, shattering her cheekbone.

  She heard herself whimper, struggling through the effects of the drug to know what was now and what was then. She closed her eyes again, trying to hold on to her sanity.

  It was Zane’s face in her mind, his voice in her subconscious, that got her through.

  All I know is
that you have the inner strength to withstand damn near anything.

  The words he had said to her after Donald Brodey attacked her at the safe house. She held on to them like a lifeline.

  Inner strength. Inner strength. Withstand damn near anything.

  Caroline opened her eyes, no longer picturing Trumpold pushing his way through the door.

  Paul Trumpold was dead. He could never hurt her again.

  His psycho sister, on the other hand, was alive and circling Caroline like some sort of predator. Caroline fought hysteria, knowing she had to work the problem in front of her, just like she did every day as a paramedic.

  “You brought me to the house where I used to live,” Caroline said as evenly as she could, studying Lisette.

  “Yes.” Lisette actually looked pretty excited that Caroline recognized it. “I rented it from the new owners.”

  Caroline resisted the urge to point out how sick that was.

  “Are you working with Donald Brodey?”

  Lisette began pacing back and forth. “To a degree. He had his usefulness.”

  That didn’t make any sense to Caroline, and it ultimately didn’t matter, since he wasn’t here to help Lisette, so Caroline decided to try a different tack. The most direct one. “What do you want, Lisette?”

  “I want you to pay for what you’ve done. I want you to tell the truth.”

  That sounded like what Zane had told her Donald Brodey had said. But Brodey wasn’t connected to the Trumpolds in any way that they knew of.

  “And what truth is that exactly?”

  “I want you to admit to the world that you lied about my brother. About what you said he did to you. I know you lied.”

  She could see the other woman getting worked up just thinking about it. “Lisette, why do you think I lied? What reason would I have to lie about something like that?”

  Lisette stopped her pacing and stared at Caroline. “He said you would say that. That you would say you had no reason to lie.”