Protect and Serve: Soldiers, SEALs and Cops: Contemporary Heroes from NY Times and USA Today and other bestselling authors

by J. M. Madden

  “First,” Will said, “you never looked like a skank. You were beautiful four years ago, and you’re beautiful now.”

  He really was the world’s best liar, if he could say that with a straight face.

  “I looked like a cheap whore,” I told him. “I dressed to get attention, and I got plenty of it. But I was never beautiful.” And after what Stan had done to me, I was damaged goods. Broken. Ugly.

  “You were beautiful,” Will insisted. “And yeah, you got plenty of attention. You certainly got mine. And now you’re gonna get his.”

  A shiver crept down my spine. “His, who?”

  Will leaned back on his chair. “Like I told your brother, we have a serial rapist. Someone’s going around Miami sexually assaulting women.”

  The air conditioning was blasting, and I told myself that’s why I was feeling cold. “How many?”

  “Three so far,” Will said. “He doesn’t do it every day. He doesn’t even do it on a regular basis. There was one Monday two weeks ago, then one last Friday, and one on Tuesday. So no rhyme or reason to the days.”

  “How do you know it wasn’t just three different guys? Were they the only three rapes in the city during that time?”

  He nodded. “Same MO, same victim type.”

  “Let me guess. My type.”

  “He likes Hispanic women,” Will said. “And he picks them up in nightclubs. Or going home from nightclubs, rather.”

  So I’d be expected to dress in a skimpy dress and high heels and dance the night away, while I waited for some sick bastard to grab and sexually assault me.

  “I still don’t understand why you want me for this. We’re in South Florida. There must be Latina cops in the Miami PD that you can use.”

  “Plenty of them,” Will nodded. “That’s not the problem.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  He sighed. “The women all said he wore a dark uniform and had a gun. He used it to threaten them. They were traumatized, and don’t really remember many of the details.”

  I wished I were that lucky. I remember all the details. Sometimes they play on a loop in my head at night, when I can’t sleep.

  “You’re thinking he’s a cop,” I said.

  “I’m not thinking anything,” Will answered, not sounding remotely sincere this time. Of course he was thinking something. Or worrying about it. “We don’t know what he is. Could be a cop. Could be private security of some sort. Could even be military. Or he could just be a civilian who owns some sort of dark uniform and a gun.”

  I nodded.

  “None of the women got a good enough look at him to give a solid description. He had a hat pulled down over his face, and shined a flashlight in their faces.”

  “Even when he raped them?” Amazingly, my voice was steady.

  “He did that from behind,” Will said, as calmly as if we weren’t talking about one human being assaulting another. “He made sure they didn’t get a good look at his face. They say he spoke and acted like a cop. But that doesn’t mean he is one.”

  Didn’t mean he wasn’t, either. But I was sure Will knew that, so I didn’t mention it.

  “But just in case there’s a law enforcement connection,” Will said, “I can’t use someone who’s already attached to the department. Someone he might recognize. I need someone like you.”

  “I’ve just gone through six months of law enforcement training,” I pointed out. “Plenty of people have seen me. All the instructors at the Police College. The guest lecturers. The other recruits. And I was in Murphy’s Law last night.”

  Will nodded. “But even if the perp is one of those people, he won’t suspect that you’re undercover. He’ll just think you’re living it up for a couple of days before you go back to Key West. He’ll know you’re not working for Miami PD.”

  “But will he try for me if he knows I’m a cop?”

  It was the first time I’d said the words out loud—I’m a cop—and they tasted weird. I don’t think Will could tell, though, because his expression didn’t change.

  “There’s no way to know. But this is our best shot at catching him. Before he attacks any more civilians.”

  Sure. We’d just wait for him to attack me instead.

  “Exactly how are you planning to make sure nothing happens to me?” I wanted to know. “Because if this guy has a gun, and he gets me alone, there isn’t a whole lot I can do to stop him from doing whatever he wants to me.” Except kill him with my bare hands, and doing that would probably be a temptation at that point. I wasn’t sure even a gun pointed my way would deter me.

  “I’ll be watching you,” Will said.

  “What if you look away? Or have to use the bathroom? Or some woman comes up to you and tries to pick you up?”

  He rolled his eyes. “You’ll be wired for sound.”

  “Who’ll be listening to me?”

  “Me,” Will said. “And a dude in a van on the street outside.”

  “What if he has to use the bathroom? Or some woman tries to pick him up?”

  “He’ll be inside the van,” Will said. “Nobody will see him, so nobody will try to pick him up. And we’ll make sure we don’t go to the bathroom at the same time.”

  “So if this guy tries anything, you’ll stop him?”

  He nodded. “I promise. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  He looked sincere. Those were some very pretty blue eyes. I probably had slept with him. Not just because he’d told me so, but because I could totally see myself falling for all that boyish charm. He’d probably been really cute four years ago.

  He was really cute now, too. The old me would have been all over him. The new me might even have been interested, if she hadn’t been terrified of intimacy. And terrified of having to explain why.

  But since we were just going to be working together anyway, it was all moot.

  “Time to go shopping,” Will said and pushed his chair away from the table. “You need a skimpy dress and some fuck-me shoes. And a lot more makeup. C’mon.”

  He headed for the door. I got off my chair and followed.

  FOUR

  At nine o’clock that night, I made my way into Courant, one of Miami’s current hot spots. I was wearing a skimpy dress and a pair of shoes that had made Will speechless for a full twenty seconds. It was mostly the price, I think. But they were tall and black and strappy, and looked a lot like a pair I used to have... oh, four years ago or so.

  The dress was red: short and tight and low-cut, with hardly any back. For having used very little fabric, it cost a pretty penny. Will certainly didn’t skimp on my outfit for this operation. He insisted on sexy underwear, too—not that anyone would be seeing it, something I made clear to him. He bought it anyway, and when he dropped me off outside my apartment at the end of the trip, he handed me the shopping bags and told me, “I’ll be here at eight to wire you up.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “We talked about this,” Will said. “You’ll be wearing a wire. Someone has to put it on you.”

  “I can put on my own damn wire!” I was a cop, wasn’t I? We’d been taught about wires in school.

  “I’m sure you can,” Will said calmly, “but I’m not taking any chances. I’m putting it on you, and I’m making sure it works. That’s the only way I’ll let you go out there.”

  Part of me wanted to announce that I didn’t want to go out there anyway. But I bit it back. This was what I’d become a cop for, even if it was scary, and besides, I was afraid that kind of back-talk might be considered insubordination. I didn’t really work for or with Will, but if he was right and I was officially on loan to the Miami PD, I should probably endeavor to stay on his good side.

  “This is why you bought the underwear,” I said suspiciously, “isn’t it?”

  He smiled. “I’ll see you at eight. Don’t bother to put on the dress until I get there.”

  He didn’t wait for me to answer, just pulled away from the curb and into traffic. I directed
a fulminating stare after the car, and went upstairs.

  The first thing I did, after dropping the shopping bags on the bed, was dial my brother’s number. “You loaned me to the Miami PD?” I asked when he answered.

  There was a beat. “They spent six months training you. I figured if they wanted to keep you a few extra days, I should let them.”

  “What if I didn’t want to stay any longer?”

  There was another beat. “You telling me you’re ready to come home, ‘mana?”

  Well, no. “I’m just saying, if.”

  Enrique snorted. “We both know you don’t wanna be here. This’ll give you a chance to stay away a couple extra days. And help the Miami PD catch someone like Stan. It’s what you said you wanted to do.”

  I was starting to regret ever saying that. What I should have said, was that I wanted a nice desk-job out of harm’s way, where nothing bad would ever happen to me.

  Again. Nothing bad would ever happen to me again.

  “I’m scared,” I told him. “Did Will tell you what he wants me to do?”

  I could practically hear Enrique’s eyebrows rise. “Will, is it? Just how well do you know Detective Murphy?”

  “We only met last night,” I said. “But he thinks I slept with him four years ago.”

  Silence.

  “Did you?” Enrique asked finally.

  “I have no idea. I can’t remember him, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. I slept with a lot of people back then.”

  I waited for Enrique to comment. When he didn’t, I added, “Anyway, he thinks he knows me. I’m not sure he believes me when I say I don’t remember him. And I don’t want to tell him... you know.”

  “No,” Enrique said. “That’s none of his business.”

  Something inside me relaxed. I’d been afraid he’d recommend I come clean with Will. About everything.

  “Unless you’re getting involved with him,” Enrique added. “Then he’ll need to know.”

  “I’m not.” Just the thought of getting involved with someone, of getting intimate again, made it hard to breathe. I felt like I was drowning.

  Note to self: not ready for a boyfriend.

  “So what’s he having you do?”

  “Put on a skimpy dress and high heels and go clubbing. Can you believe it?”

  “I figured it was something like that,” Enrique said calmly. “Is he making sure you’re covered?”

  I assumed he didn’t mean by clothing. Because if so, the answer was, ‘Not really.’ “He’ll be here at eight to put a wire on me. There’ll be a guy in a van listening in. And Will will be inside the club.”

  “Sounds like they’ve got you well protected, then.”

  It did. As long as the noise level in the club wasn’t so high that they couldn’t hear anything but music through the mic.

  Then again, I hadn’t gotten the impression that the rapist had attacked women inside the clubs. It sounded more like he’d caught them on their way home. So I wouldn’t be in any danger until I was outside the club and alone. When, presumably, it would be quiet.

  “This will be good for you, Carmen,” Enrique told me. “I know it’s scary. I’m scared every time I strap on a gun and go after somebody. But once you catch him and put him away, it’ll help.”

  I hoped he was right. Because at the moment, all I really wanted to do was curl up in a ball on the bed and whimper.

  Will knocked on the door at eight o’clock sharp.

  “Cal’s downstairs in the van,” he told me. “Once we get you mic’ed up, we’ll make sure he can hear you, and then you can finish getting ready on your own.”

  I nodded. I had opened the door in a bathrobe and bare feet. Part of me—the old Carmen—had thought about strapping on the shoes, just to see what kind of reaction I’d get once I dropped the robe and stood there in four inch heels and red lace. But new Carmen had thought better of it. It wasn’t a reaction I was prepared to deal with.

  Even so, taking off the robe and standing there in just my underwear was hard. Other than the nurses and doctors at the hospital, it was the first time I’d been naked—or anywhere close to naked—in front of anyone since the second time Stan raped me.

  The bruises had faded, and he hadn’t hurt me in any other way. I didn’t have scars. None that showed. In most ways, I probably looked very much as I had four years ago. My hair was shorter. I’d hacked it off as soon as I got out of the hospital. Stan had had his hands in it, had used it to hurt me, and I couldn’t wait to get rid of it. It hadn’t grown back nearly as long as it had been. It was just down to my shoulders, where it used to be most of the way down my back. But I still looked good. The way Will’s eyes darkened told me so, even though he didn’t say a word.

  “This is the microphone.” He held it up. It was barely bigger than the pad of his thumb, and wireless. “It has to go against skin. Inside your bra would be best, since there’ll be a minimum of friction interfering with the sound.”

  Meaning I filled the bra out well enough that the contents weren’t likely to shift during transport. Gotcha.

  “Go ahead.” I dropped my hands to my sides, my fists clenching automatically as he came closer. It took everything I had of self-control to stand still while he pulled down the edge of the bra and stuck the microphone to my skin.

  “This goes over it.” It was a small piece of sticky fabric, roughly the color of my skin, that kept the mic in place and, hopefully, made it less noticeable if anyone happened to look down my dress. Which I assumed would happen. Men used to look down my dresses all the time, and this particular dress was designed for just that.

  Will patted the fabric in place over the mic and stepped back, his cheekbones pink. “This is the earpiece.” He handed it to me without looking at me. It was no bigger than the mic, and also wireless. “Stick it in your ear. You’ll be able to hear me talk to you, although you won’t hear Cal.”

  “That can wait until I’m there, though, right?”

  He nodded.

  “Anything else?”

  “We just have to make sure Cal can hear you. Can you hear her, Cal?”

  I couldn’t hear Cal, but Will nodded. “He says he can hear both of us loud and clear. Say hi, Carmen.”

  “Hi, Carmen,” I said.

  “Cal says hi. OK, buddy. Shut it down until she gets to the club. I’ll be downstairs in a minute.”

  Cal must have acknowledged the comment, because Will turned back to me. “You’re off the air until we get to Courant. You’ll make your own way there. Call a cab. The Miami PD will reimburse you for the expense.”

  Nice.

  “Cal and the van will be parked outside somewhere, where he can see the entrance to the club. When he sees you go inside, he’ll activate the mic.”

  I nodded.

  “I’ll already be inside. But don’t look for me.”

  I shook my head.

  “I’ll be watching you. I’ll only interfere if you sound like you need help.”

  I nodded.

  “Are you nervous?”

  I nodded.

  He smiled. “You’ll do great. I’ve seen you work a dance floor before. You’ll have every guy in the place tripping over his tongue.”

  Great.

  “Just don’t accept drinks from anyone. And don’t put yours down anywhere.”

  I shook my head. No, I’d learned that lesson the hard way. I wasn’t about to make the same mistake again.

  “Hopefully we’ll get lucky and catch the guy tonight. That way we won’t have to do this again tomorrow. And he hasn’t hit Courant yet. We figure it’s time.”

  I nodded.

  “You OK?”

  “No. But I’ll get there.” Just as soon as I decided whether I’d rather do this again tomorrow, or face a rapist tonight.

  Talk about a rock and a hard place.

  “Anything I can do?” Will asked.

  I shook my head. “No. Thank you. Just keep watching. Make sure you don’t leav
e him alone with me.”

  He nodded. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  It looked like he hesitated, like maybe he was thinking of leaning in and kissing me. But I moved back, my breath catching in my throat, and he did, too.

  “Make sure you’re there by nine.” He headed for the door to the hallway.

  “You, too,” I said, and locked and bolted the door behind him.

  And then I finished dressing and putting on my shoes, and called a cab. And at nine o’clock, I walked through the door of Courant.

  My stomach was churning with a mixture of fear and memories and excitement and dread. I had spent a lot of time in places like this, and while things had happened that I couldn’t remember—like sleeping with Will—there’d been a lot of good times, as well. Or at least they’d been good until I realized how much had happened that I didn’t even know about.

  But I’d enjoyed the music, and the dancing, and the flirting, and the admiring glances.

  But now there was fear mixed with it, and dread of what I might be facing. I’d been raped before. I knew the experience intimately. And willingly walking into the possibility of having it happen again took courage. More of it than I felt like I had.

  I trusted that Will would keep an eye on me. And I trusted that Cal had turned on the mic when he was supposed to, and could hear me. I trusted them because I had to. But I also knew that sometimes things happen even when everyone is diligent and careful.

  I hadn’t seen the van outside, and I didn’t see Will inside. He saw me, though. A couple of minutes after walking through the door, I heard his voice in my ear. “I’ve got you.”

  I didn’t answer, since I didn’t want to look like I was talking to myself. Or worse, like I was wearing a microphone and an earbud, and someone was monitoring me. I did a little headbob, though, and tried to make it look like I was just flipping my hair.

  “Looking good,” Will said in my ear. “Go dance. The other women all liked to dance.”

  I danced, and kept an eye out for anyone suspicious.

  There were plenty of guys in black shirts and pants around. None with a gun belt, though.

  But of course not. The guy wouldn’t be wearing his uniform and gun in the nightclub. Not unless he was security. And that should be easy to check. I assumed Will already had. Whatever his other failings were, he wasn’t stupid enough to overlook something obvious like that.