by Julie Miller
She wasn’t alone. She could call for help. She repeated the phrase, “I am not alone.” Anyway, the shadow had disappeared. Maybe the movement had even been a figment of her weary imagination. She’d been awake so long that distinguishing fantasy from reality was getting—
A dark shape suddenly filled the door frame and Holly backed into the counter, knocking over a rack of vials. There was no reasoning with her fear. “I’m calling security,” she warned, pushing away from the counter and forcing her feet to move toward her office where she could put a locked door between her and the intruder.
Holly never reached her office.
The door swung open. She glimpsed a black sleeve reaching in before the lab was plunged into darkness. The footsteps charging toward her sounded louder than her cries for help. Holly ran toward her office, knocked her shin against a rolling cart, tipping cart and contents onto the floor.
As she stumbled to find her footing again, a bright light flashed in her eyes, blinding her for the seconds it took her assailant to cross the room. A shadow loomed up that was blacker than the darkness surrounding it. Arms reached for her. Holly screamed, hurled her clipboard at the shadow’s chest and ran. But her stockinged feet offered little traction on the linoleum floor. The narrow beam of light shifted, shining straight up to the ceiling.
Then the light itself seemed to attack. Fire exploded in the side of her skull and Holly crumpled to her hands and knees.
She clawed at the arms that tried to pick her up, but could find no purchase, and soon enough the black hands gave up their effort and left her in a pile on the floor. She blinked through the pain swirling round inside her skull. There were dark spots on her lab coat. Huh? Was that blood staining the sleeve? She must have broken the vial she’d been testing and compromised the sample. No. Wait. Hadn’t she left the sample on the counter? Make sense of this, Holly. Make sense. But the room heaved and she couldn’t think. Her eyes wouldn’t focus. Her stomach rolled. She couldn’t hold her head up.
She flopped over onto her side and the deadly light swept across her arm. Wait a minute. That was her blood.
But the moment of clarity passed and her brain shut down.
The last thing she remembered was watching her feet slide along behind her across the floor of the autopsy lab. She was going somewhere, except her legs weren’t moving. And then…
Blackness.
HER PHONE WAS RINGING.
Holly’s head felt heavy on her pillow. She must have crashed hard by the time she got home and crawled into bed. If she kept her eyes closed and pretended to be in a deep sleep, maybe Jillian would get it.
It rang again.
She slit one eye open in the darkness. Who was calling so early? Come on, Jillian. Please.
Another ring. The second eye opened.
Why was it so cold in her apartment? Had Jillian burned the toast again and opened a window to let the smoke out?
She couldn’t smell anything burning. What she smelled was something faintly antiseptic. She must have worn her lab coat home again. But why was she sleeping in it?
“Jillian?”
One croaky word and shards of pain pierced her skull.
Holly tried to roll over to read the clock on her bedside table, but her hand hit the bedpost and fell back to her side. She couldn’t turn. Nausea welled up in her stomach, and Holly decided lying perfectly still was the only option if she wanted to keep her last meal down. Jillian, please.
Ring.
“Darn it.” Ignoring the pain and queasiness the movement caused her, Holly reached for the phone.
But her knuckles rapped against steel, not wood. What the…? She splayed her hand flat against the chilled surface. Where was she?
Uncertainty quickened her pulse. Certainty made it race.
Her cell phone was ringing in her pocket. Taunting her with its relentless repetition. Waking her to the nightmare of her surroundings.
“Oh, my God,” Holly squeaked, raising her hand. She hit flat steel, only a few inches above her face. “No.” Steel to her right. Steel to her left. She reached over her head. More steel. “Help me.”
She was lying inside one of the steel autopsy drawers.
Wide awake now, she knew the pain throbbing inside her head would be a minor thing if she couldn’t get her panicked breathing under control. She tried to count to three—telling herself to breathe in through her nose and out through her mouth. Stay calm. There’s plenty of air in here.
But she had to get out. “Help?”
She knocked on the walls. “Help me!” Her cries bounced off the sterile walls and came back to mock her. She tried to brace her feet against the wall and push the drawer open. But there was no traction for her stockinged feet. Holly pounded her fists against the opening, flinching as each sound rang like a cymbal crash through her skull. “Somebody, help me!”
And the phone kept ringing.
“Stop it!”
The panic was winning as she twisted around and pulled at her lab coat and finally reached her pocket. Her eyes watered as she fought to bring the blurry lighted screen of her cell phone into focus.
Unnamed.
Holly answered the phone. “Why are you doing this? Why?”
For a few seconds, the relaxed breathing at the other end of the call was the loudest sound inside her metal coffin.
And then she started screaming.
Chapter Seven
Edward reached the second-floor banister railing of Holly’s apartment building, feeling the unfamiliar nerves of boyish energy. But he wasn’t sure if it was silly pride over climbing the two flights of stairs without the use of his cane, or trepidation that he’d actually followed the impulse to drive over to Holly’s apartment this morning.
But he was thirty-five, a widower, and long past feeling boyish. So he took a deep breath and set off in search of apartment 212.
He had a perfectly rational reason for being here that had nothing to do with persistent thoughts about long legs and silky hair and kisses that were waking something more profound than lust in his system. Holly said she’d call him today with results from her tests on the disintegrator bullet, and since she hadn’t answered at her office or her cell phone, she must still be at home. Okay, so it was a little early to be making a house call, but if he promised coffee and breakfast, maybe he could get her to the lab and get his results sooner.
And the idea of a few sparks flaring up over the course of their breakfast conversation had gotten Edward out of bed with a purpose this morning. The chance for another face-to-face meeting with Holly Masterson had gotten him shaved and dressed and looking forward to this bright, snow-packed day more than he had any other day for a long time.
At last night’s AA meeting, they’d talked about living in the moment. He’d learned to do that as the father of a special needs child. Now he was learning how to do that all over again. With his painful past and uncertain future temporarily blocked from his mind, he was determined to live in this moment. And at this moment, he wanted to see Holly.
208. 210. 212.
He hesitated in front of the aged walnut door, trimmed in evergreen garland and candy canes. The Christmas cheer just didn’t quit with this woman, did it. “Don’t wimp out, Daddy. Do it!”
“Okay, baby. I’m doing it.” Ignoring the trappings, he focused on the center of the solid wood and knocked.
He immediately heard shuffling noises from the other side, and a voice that was not quite familiar. “Okay, well, sorry to load up your voice mail, but call when you get this. Please.” Then, “Yes?”
Now the voice was talking to him. “Holly?”
“Who is it?” Not Holly. The peephole in the door darkened as an eye looked through it.
“Are you her sister, Jillian?”
“I need a name, Mister.”
“I’m Edward Kincaid. I’m a…friend of your sister’s and a lieutenant with KCPD.”
“Prove it.”
More cosmic karma. Stubbo
rnness appeared to be a Masterson family trait.
He patted his waist, but, of course, there was no badge there. “I’m…off duty.”
“Well, then you’re out of luck. I don’t open this door to men I don’t know.”
“Holly knows me.”
There was a pause on the other side of the door. “What’s your badge number?”
That much he could give her. “Two-three-one-six. Ask Holly.”
“She isn’t here right now. Maybe you should come back later.”
Not here? A wary tension crept into Edward’s muscles. If Holly wasn’t at the office, wasn’t at home and wasn’t answering her cell, then where the heck was she?
“You don’t know where Holly is?” No answer. Tension kicked up to outright concern. He rested his hand against the locked door and leaned in, speaking as calmly and concisely as he could. “Jillian? I need you to call Fourth Precinct headquarters.” He gave her the number. “Ask anyone there to describe me. You need to let me in.”
It took a few minutes of low-pitched talking, but then he heard the chain engage on the door. “Step back a minute,” Jillian instructed. The door slid open a crack and a young woman with a dark brown ponytail wearing a Florida Gators sweatshirt peeked through. He unzipped his jacket to show her he wasn’t armed, and waited for her to scan him from head to toe. “Dark hair, scars on face, raspy voice. Where’s your cane?”
Oh, boy. Another Masterson who needed every detail to have a rational explanation. “Your sister said I didn’t need it—that I was only using it as a security blanket.”
Jillian screwed her mouth into a contemplative smile. Now that looked familiar. “She likes to fix things, doesn’t she.”
“Yeah. She was worried about your date with Blake Rivers last night, too.”
“Mama Hen talked about that, huh?” He wouldn’t say how much. “Then you do know her.” She closed the door to unhook the chain and then opened it wide. “Come on in.”
His first full impression of Jillian Masterson was that she was even taller than her sister, she was healthy and smart and Holly probably worried about her too much. And, she was scared. The darting eyes and tight set to her mouth gave her away.
Edward scanned the apartment’s main rooms. Not exactly neat as a pin, with boxes and decorations laid out to prepare for the upcoming holiday. But he couldn’t see anything obviously out of place like an open window or ransacked furniture, indicating some kind of break-in. With a nod of permission from Jillian, he moved farther into the apartment, searching the bedrooms and bath as well.
Jillian followed along behind him. “I’ve been up since seven. When I didn’t smell her tea brewing, I got worried. Her bed hasn’t even been slept in.”
“Have you tried to call her?”
“At work and on her cell. She doesn’t answer.”
Holly might not have his number identified on her phone, but she’d know her sister’s and would answer. If she could.
He didn’t bother coming up with logical excuses. He’d caught her sneaking around Caldwell Technologies, getting more deeply involved in his father’s murder investigation than he’d ever asked her to. From the trail of dead bodies left in their wake, he knew Z Group was not an organization to be messed with. Plus, she’d been getting those harassing phone calls. If whoever was on the other end of that line had upped his game to a more personal confrontation…
Edward slammed the door shut on all the unspeakable possibilities and headed back to the front door. “I’ll make some calls. Is it all right if I post a uniformed officer outside your building? If she turns up, or anything else out of place should happen, I want to know about it ASAP.”
Despite the brave set to her chin, Jillian was clearly upset by Holly’s disappearance as well. “I’ve never known her to be in any trouble before. She’s the good girl of the family—all I’ve ever known her to do is work. To stay out all night and not call in just isn’t like her.”
“I didn’t think it would be.” He opened the front door, remembering now why he’d given up pursuing any kind of serious relationship with a woman. It hurt too much to worry like this. “Give me your number. I’ll call as soon as I know anything.”
After exchanging numbers, Jillian caught the door. “Do you think she just had a flat tire or something? It was so cold last night. If she went off the road or couldn’t get help…”
If a call to one of his brothers at precinct headquarters didn’t turn up an accident report, he’d start calling area hospitals. He shouldn’t have let her drive off by herself last night. He should have followed her home instead of calling his sponsor and finding that midnight AA meeting.
Edward swallowed his guilt and his fear and patted Jillian’s shoulder. “I’ll find her. She’ll be just fine. So will you.” She nodded, taking more comfort from the words than he did. “Lock your door.”
He was at the front door of the building when Jillian came bounding down the stairs after him. “Lieutenant! Lieutenant Kincaid? I found her.” She ran up to him, holding her cell phone to her ear, but shaking her head, frowning. “I can hardly understand what she’s saying, though.”
Edward grabbed the phone from her hand. “Holly?”
“Edward?” She whispered his name on three different breaths. His heart sank. She was crying.
Retribution hit him hard in the gut and he wanted to double over with the pain. “Holly, honey, what’s wrong?”
“Help me.” Her voice sounded hoarse and weak between sniffles as she tried to control her tears. “It’s so hard to breathe.
He keeps calling me. I stopped answering my phone. And then I saw Jillian’s number.”
He hoped that was static from a bad connection and not her phone about to give out. Not Holly about to give out. “Holly?”
“I need air.”
“Pull it together, Stick. Where are you? What’s wrong?”
Jillian was listening in, her fear rising along with his at the extended silence. “Holly? Talk to us, sis. Please.”
When there was no answer, Edward flashed back to the call that had come over his radio two Christmas Eves ago. Shots fired at your house, Kincaid. André Butler sighted in area. Units responding. He closed his eyes and saw his wife and daughter lying in the snow. Saw Butler with his gun standing over them. He couldn’t do this again. He couldn’t lose anyone else.
His eyes popped open. “Holly!”
“Autopsy.” He could barely make out the whispered word. “Please, Edward. Hurry.”
“Stay on the line with Jillian, okay, honey? I’m on my way. Stay on the line until I get there.” He already had his keys out. He pushed open the door and met a blast of cold air that didn’t go as deep as the dreadful chill inside him.
THERE WERE CERTAIN ADVANTAGES to having three brothers who were active-duty cops. When a man needed to speed through the streets of Kansas City without being pulled over, he could call in a favor.
And there wasn’t any backup he trusted more than knowing Holden was on the phone, alerting the crime lab’s security supervisor to a possible situation in their building and ordering an EMT unit to be on standby at the scene. With Atticus leading the way, lights flashing, and Sawyer closing in behind him, Edward flew toward southern Kansas City and the new crime lab building. The twenty-minute drive took ten.
Ten minutes too long as far as Edward was concerned. Bypassing the parking garage, his SUV fishtailed into the circular drive at the front of the building. Throwing up snow and slush and hopping the curb, his heavy vehicle skidded to a halt outside the main doors.
A news van had somehow joined the race, and pulled in right behind him seconds later. While Edward climbed out of his Jeep, a blond reporter jumped out of the passenger side of the van. Waving to her cameraman to hurry and join her, she ran to catch up with Edward’s long, uneven stride. “Excuse me, Detective? It is ‘detective,’ isn’t it? I’m Hayley Resnick with the evening news. I cover the crime beat. Don’t I recognize you from the André Butler
case? You’re the cop who killed him with his car.”
He fisted his hands and kept walking.
But she moved those legs pretty fast. “Is it true that one of the CSIs has been attacked? Can you tell me what case the attack might be related to?”
“How the hell do you know what’s going on here?” He glared down at the microphone she tried to shove in his face. “I just found out about the incident myself.”
“Police scanners, detective. I’m allowed to tune in and find out what’s going on at KCPD.” Her blue eyes sparkled with some kind of triumph. “So there has been an incident.”
He pushed the microphone away. “Get out of my face.”
While Atticus urged him away from the camera light, Sawyer had pulled up in his truck. “Allow me, Ed,” he called, running up to join them. “Ms. Resnick. As I recall, you were harassing my wife the last time we met. How’s your year been going since then?”
“I owe you one,” Edward mouthed.
Sawyer winked. Then he positioned his big, bad self between Edward and the camera, effectively blocking the shot and any more questions from the reporter. “I’ve got this under control out here.” Sawyer’s promise was one he could bank on. “I’ll get the EMTs inside as soon as they arrive. Keep me posted.” Doffing a salute, he turned his attention to making nice with the reporter and her crew while Edward went inside.
“Hey. What’s all the fuss? Are you looking for Holly, Lieutenant?” A young man in a white lab coat—the kid with the spiky hair who’d been such a suck-up yesterday in Holly’s office—pushed past a pair of waiting security guards.
“Temple, is it?” Edward broke stride long enough to address the CSI. He dared to hope that this was all some kind of mix-up. “Do you know where she is? Have you seen her this morning?”