Physical Evidence

by Debra Webb

  ALEX SLOWLY OPENED her eyes and stared at the ceiling of her room. Something was different, but she couldn’t be sure what. A dull ache throbbed deep in her skull, making focused concentration impossible. She stretched and sore muscles screamed in protest. The memory of a fist slamming into her stomach, of steel fingers gripping her throat and shoving her hard ricocheted through her mind. The ache in her skull exploded into fierce pain. She groaned and sat up, resting her head in her hands.

  It took her a few seconds to realize the fierce agony wasn’t real, only remembered from an event that hovered behind an impenetrable wall that wouldn’t allow her to recall the last six days of her life. When she’d finally convinced herself it wasn’t real, the dull ache was all that remained.

  How had she lost that whole block of time? Why couldn’t she remember? The concept seemed completely foreign to her. She should simply be able to retrieve those lost hours like so much data on a floppy disk. But she couldn’t. The flash of memory she’d just experienced was only the second little frame of recall she’d had since waking up in the hospital the day before yesterday.

  The neurologist had said that it could be all or nothing, and would likely come in spurts. There was no way to speculate how much she would recall, and no reliable means to speed up her recovery.

  Frowning, Alex returned to the problem at hand. Where was she? The image of Mitch Hayden offering her clean clothes at the bathroom door zoomed into vivid 3-D focus. She was at his house. That’s right. She’d come here because she knew no one would look for her here…she’d be safe. Something else she couldn’t remember nagged at her, making her a little less sure of the safe part, but she couldn’t grasp it. She hadn’t actually left the hospital with this destination in mind, she’d just wound up here and then the notion that no one would look for her at this particular location had gelled. He was the sheriff, after all, why would anyone look for her at his house?

  Gingerly, she touched the bandage on her forehead. The image of fire blasting from the muzzle of a handgun aimed at her face seized her. She gasped with remembered terror and hugged her arms around her middle. She squeezed her eyes shut and rocked back and forth to calm herself. Her heart pounded so hard her chest hurt. He was going to kill her. He would never let her live knowing what she surely knew—his identity. Alex didn’t know how she knew it was a he, she just did. She was as certain of it as she was that he would try to kill her before she remembered. He had to…

  “Good morning.”

  Alex snapped her eyes open at the sound of a deep male voice. Mitch Hayden’s slow southern drawl to be exact. He stood in the doorway, propped against the frame. As she watched, he straightened and moved toward the bed. She grappled for the composure that usually came so easily for her. Whoever had worked her over had definitely scrambled her thinking. She was in the middle of a huge identity crisis that involved murder and mayhem and all she could do at the moment was notice how good the sheriff looked. Flashes of memory from last night kept popping into her head. His shirt hanging open, revealing a magnificent chest. His scent, something male and musky, when he’d held her so close as she broke down in his arms. Something about him drew her. It didn’t make sense.

  “Good morning,” she returned as calmly as her churning emotions would allow when he paused a few feet away. Feeling vulnerable in her current position, she climbed out of bed and straightened her borrowed clothes, then combed her fingers through her hair in an attempt to pull herself together on the outside at least. “I appreciate you not taking me back to the hospital last night.”

  “You don’t need to thank me,” he said quietly, those Artic-blue eyes clocking her every move. “It wasn’t a favor to you. I had my reasons.”

  She was his prime suspect. How could she forget? Alex folded her arms over her chest and for a long moment studied the handsome sheriff who appeared hell-bent on adding to her misery. One single frame of memory flickered—Mitch Hayden angry and shouting at her. She flinched. The snatch of recall disintegrated as suddenly as it appeared. She cursed silently for not being able to hold on to the fleeting images long enough to decipher what they meant. She had to remember. Her freedom—not to mention her life—depended upon it.

  “I didn’t shoot either of those men.” Alex blinked back the uncharacteristic urge to cry. She was stronger than this. She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. Much stronger. “In fact, I think you should stop wasting time trying to decide whether or not I’m guilty.”

  He lifted one tawny eyebrow. “What makes you think I haven’t already decided?”

  Uncertainty pulled the plug on her bravado, but she stood firm against the sinking feeling. “If you had, I’d have been in a cell this morning instead of in your bed.”

  That cool gaze flicked from her to the rumpled sheets and back. “This isn’t my bed,” he said tightly.

  Drawing courage from her direct hit, she replied, “Close enough.”

  Quite obviously ill at ease now, he turned back toward the door and started out of the room. “You should eat. You’re going to need your strength. I’ll wait for you in the kitchen.”

  Was that a warning? Alex mused as she watched him go. It sure sounded like one. She frowned when she considered that she needed to call Victoria. That first day in the hospital she’d been too disoriented to call anyone, then the killer had struck again before she’d had a chance to demand her rights be acknowledged. Alex squeezed her eyes shut to block the vivid mental images that accompanied the memory of Deputy Saylor’s murder.

  Determined to pull it together she headed in the direction of the bathroom she’d used last night. She had to find a way to clear herself of suspicion. And since her memory was not cooperating, she’d just have to utilize her investigative skills.

  Alex closed and locked the bathroom door, then took care of essentials. As she washed her hands she studied her reflection in the mirror. Her right cheek was still slightly discolored from…the sound of the back of a hand slapping against her cheek reverberated in her head. She jerked at the remembered sting. Alex touched her cheek and tried to remember more. Trees. Darkness. Someone shouting in the background. A male voice. The feel of the leaf-covered ground beneath her. The wind going out of her lungs when someone kicked her in the stomach. The sound of gunfire. Stark fear.

  Trembling violently, she snapped back to the here and now. Alex fumbled around in the drawers until she found a brush. Taking slow, deep breaths to counter the adrenaline surging inside her body, she tugged the brush through her hair. Calm down, she ordered the frightened eyes in the mirror. You’re safe now. Sheriff Hayden had no intention of allowing anything to happen to her. She was his only witness—and suspect. Another of those fleeting images slipped in then out of her thoughts. Hayden shouting at her, fury in his expression. And then that strong pull she felt for him…some kind of unexplainable connection.

  Alex shook off the worrisome thoughts and forced one foot in front of the other until she found him in the kitchen. He’d poured her a cup of coffee and prepared toast. He stood, leaning against a nearby counter, waiting patiently.

  He wanted answers. The evidence against her was apparently considerable since he wasn’t out beating the bushes for another suspect. Or maybe he just hoped she would remember everything and save him the trouble. She sat down and took a much-needed sip of coffee. Her stomach rumbled. She tasted the toast he had gone to the trouble to butter and waited for him to begin his new round of interrogation.

  But he didn’t.

  Unable to tolerate the prolonged anticipation, she asked, “How does the evidence stack up against me?”

  “Your prints are on the murder weapon.” He nodded to the right hand she’d just lifted to take another bite of toast. “You had the powder residue to prove you were holding the weapon when it fired.”

  Alex stared at her hand. She swallowed, hard. Her appetite vanished and she dropped the toast back onto the saucer. “Well, there’s a good start for a murder case,” she allow
ed. She stared directly at him then. “Now all you need is motive, and you can nail me.”

  She didn’t miss the little flutter of muscle in his tightly clenched jaw before he responded. “That would help. But then, if I have to, I’ll nail you without it if you killed my deputy.”

  Averting her gaze from his intense one, she sipped her coffee thoughtfully. Anxiety coiled in her stomach threatening her flimsy hold on composure, chinking away at her certainty that she was innocent. She had to be. She would never kill anyone unless it was to save her own life—or someone else’s. Some part of her felt like the sheriff knew it, too. Otherwise she would be in a cell.

  “You realize, of course, that I don’t have to answer any questions without legal counsel present,” she said then. She hardly recognized the strained voice as her own. God, she was a mess.

  “I didn’t ask any questions.” Those too-discerning eyes remained focused on hers.

  Alex almost laughed at that one. He wouldn’t ask any questions, because he knew that legally he couldn’t. But he could make her feel the pressure of proving her innocence. “I can’t tell you what happened, because I don’t know,” she admitted with complete candor. “And I don’t know how Miller tied into my investigation, but he isn’t the reason I came here.”

  Hayden didn’t say a word. He simply stood there, waiting for her to continue if she chose.

  “I came to Shady Grove to look into the disappearance of Marija Bukovak, a foreign exchange student from Croatia.” He didn’t even blink. “She was staying here with a local family, the Malloys. She hasn’t been seen since they left her at the airport about three months ago. Jasna, her sister, didn’t feel like the police had done enough so she asked my agency to see what we could find.”

  A subtle change in his expression told her that her last remark didn’t sit too well with him.

  “Did she also tell you that there have been a series of murders in the Nashville and Murfreesboro areas that the police believe might be connected to her sister’s disappearance?”

  Her brow creased in confusion. There had been no mention of any kind of ongoing investigation connected to Marija’s disappearance. “What murders?”

  “The sophomore murders,” he explained. “Six young women were found between April and July of this year, all students at nearby universities. Each was sexually assaulted, strangled to death and then buried in a shallow grave in the woods. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigations apprehended the killer last month. Davidson County thinks maybe the Bukovak girl was one of his victims, but he hasn’t confessed to the crime. She’s the only unsolved case of a missing person from this area that fits the profile.”

  “He confessed to having murdered the other six?”

  Hayden eyed her speculatively for a couple of seconds before answering. “He did.”

  Alex shook her head. “Then he didn’t do the Bukovak girl,” she said succinctly.

  He inclined his head and lifted a skeptical brow. “You’re positive about that.”

  “Absolutely.” She chewed on a bite of toast as she considered all that he’d told her, then washed it down with more coffee. “Serial killers don’t work that way. If he confessed, he confessed all. He wouldn’t have bothered otherwise.” She frowned. “Unless he’s playing some sort of game. He might reveal bits and pieces if that’s the case.”

  “And you would be an expert in that area,” he suggested, still looking skeptical.

  “Yes.” She pushed the remainder of her breakfast away. “Didn’t the TBI guys come to the same conclusion?” If they hadn’t, then they needed to be in another line of work.

  “That was their feeling, but no one can really be sure.” Hayden glanced at her half-eaten toast. “Are you finished?”

  She stood. “I’d like to call Victoria Colby, she’s my boss and I need to check in.”

  “I’ve already talked to Mrs. Colby.” He pushed off from the counter. “Come on. We’ll stop by your hotel room and pick up a change of clothes and some shoes.”

  Surprised, Alex stared after him as he left the room. “When did you call?” she asked, following him into the hall.

  “I didn’t. I flew up there to find out what you were working on.” He stopped and turned to face her.

  Alex was a little slower to react, almost running into him before she stopped. When her gaze connected with his she wasn’t prepared for the rush of sensations that accompanied standing so close to him and looking directly into his eyes. Warmth spread through her middle, and her heart kicked into a faster rhythm.

  “Your friend Ashton came back with me. He’ll be meeting us at my office at nine.”

  “Zach is here?” A smile stretched across her face and a great deal of the weight sagging her shoulders lifted. She needed him right now. At least he would be on her side.

  Something changed in the sheriff’s eyes, but Alex couldn’t quite read what she saw there. “He’s here,” Hayden affirmed. “We should get going so we don’t keep him waiting.”

  MITCH WATCHED the reunion with growing irritation—mostly with himself. After the emotional embraces and assurances were exchanged, Ashton still managed to find a way to touch Alex. He squeezed her hand…touched her bruised cheek. Mitch hated that it disturbed him so, but it did just the same. He hated even more the curious glances his bringing Alex in had generated among his own men. The glare Ashton had arrowed at him the moment they stepped through the door had been blistering. Any one of those things should have made Mitch realize just how far out of bounds he’d allowed his judgment to go. But none did.

  That one night at the diner he and Alex had somehow connected over the blue plate special. Hours of nothing but talking and laughing and too-intense eye contact. He just couldn’t shake that strange bond now. The connection had been electric…still was. And it was playing havoc with his ability to look at this case objectively. Case in point, she’d been lying to him the whole time. Told him that she was just passing through. And he’d believed her. That almost-kiss when he’d walked her to her car that night still stirred his blood.

  The very next morning he’d found out who she really was. He’d been furious with himself for being so gullible. It wasn’t going to happen again. And look at him now. The only highlight of the whole mess was that she didn’t seem to remember anything about that night either, and he’d just as soon it stayed that way. He didn’t relish the idea of being recognized as a fool twice.

  Mitch forced those thoughts away. “We should get started,” he announced, interrupting the hushed exchange taking place in the middle of his own office.

  Ashton guided Alex to a visitor’s chair, his hand at the small of her back, the gesture clearly welcome and familiar. Mitch gritted his teeth against how that simple move made him feel. He rationalized his unwarranted emotions with the fact that she was a suspect and a witness. Her well-being was supposed to be important to him and the case.

  Good one, Hayden, he chastised silently.

  Ashton took the seat next to her. “You broke the rules, Hayden,” he accused, a new glare now directed at Mitch.

  Mitch settled into his own chair. “I didn’t ask her a single question.”

  When Ashton would have argued semantics, Alex raised a hand to stop him. “He didn’t ask, Zach,” she assured him. “I want this cleared up just as much as he does.”

  “I’m not sure you’re up to this,” Ashton argued.

  “I’m fine.” She sat straighter in her chair. “I just can’t remember the things I need to.”

  Mitch studied her as she protested Ashton’s attempts to sway her into being reevaluated by a specialist of his choosing. She could hold her own with the guy. And that only made her more appealing.

  She’d twisted her shoulder-length hair up into a youthful but conservative style, showing off that long, slender neck. The navy slacks and pale blue blouse fit a little loosely. For comfort, Mitch supposed. Alex didn’t strike him as the type who would forego comfort to show off her figure. Besides, he’d
already seen enough of her to know she had a terrific body. His own body tightened at the remembered feel of hers when he’d held her.

  He shut off that line of thinking and focused on the matter at hand. He had two dead deputies. And Alex Preston was somehow involved in their deaths, if by no other means than the fact that she was present at both shootings.

  “Let’s start by you telling me how you got out of the hospital and to my house,” Mitch said, dragging the two from the heated discussion.

  To his credit, Ashton kept his mouth shut.

  Alex thought for a while before she spoke. Her expression grew solemn. “When I was sure I couldn’t help the deputy, I made my way to the door and into the corridor. I was afraid that whoever was shooting at me would try again….” She frowned. “Or may become after me.

  “Once I got into the corridor I considered going to the nurse’s desk, but there wasn’t anyone there. It was like everyone had disappeared. That spooked me. I started for the elevators, but one opened and I was afraid it was the shooter, so I hid behind the closest door, which turned out to be a supply closet.”

  “That’s where you got the lab coat,” Mitch guessed.

  She nodded. “When the coast was clear I ran like hell. I don’t think anyone even noticed I was missing from the room until after I’d left the hospital. The shots didn’t make that much noise. I don’t know if Saylor would even have heard anything if I hadn’t bumped into the table and knocked the telephone off it.” She blinked, her eyes bright.

  The shooter had used a sound suppressor, which explained why no one at the hotel seemed to have heard anything. Both items were being tested by ballistics at that very moment.