Stop Me

by Brenda Novak

  A classic story by New York Times bestselling author Brenda Novak, nominated for a RITA Award for Best Romantic Suspense

  Romain Fornier lost his reason for living when his daughter was kidnapped and murdered. He used a cop’s gun to mete out his own justice and spent the next few years in prison. Once he was freed, he returned to his Cajun roots in small-town Louisiana. But now he learns that he might have killed the wrong man.

  Jasmine Stratford, a psychological profiler, is convinced his daughter’s killer is still alive-and that she and Romain have something in common. She believes the same man kidnapped her sister, Kimberly, sixteen years ago.

  Jasmine is determined to track him down when she receives an anonymous package, postmarked New Orleans-the bracelet she gave Kimberly for her eighth birthday. She approaches Romain because she knows he can help her... if he chooses.

  But searching for the man who irrevocably changed both their lives means they have to rise to a killer’s challenge: stop me.

  Originally published in 2008

  Praise for

  BRENDA NOVAK

  “Brenda Novak’s seamless plotting, emotional intensity and true-to-life characters who jump off the page make her books completely satisfying. Novak is simply a great storyteller.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Allison Brennan

  “Strong characters bring the escalating suspense to life and the mystery is skillfully played out. Novak’s smooth plotting makes for a great read.”

  —Publishers Weekly on Dead Right

  “Well-written, nicely paced, filled with appealing characters and laced with a few surprises, this story wraps up a mystery that has kept readers enthralled for almost a year.”

  —Library Journal on Dead Right

  “Every book is a winner! Brenda Novak doesn’t just write fabulous stories, she writes keepers.”

  —USA TODAY bestselling author Susan Mallery

  “Strongly defined characters, sizzling sexual tension and a tautly constructed plot steeped in danger blend brilliantly together in Novak’s exceptionally intense, powerfully emotional novel of romantic suspense.”

  —Booklist on Every Waking Moment

  “Brenda Novak has carved out her spot among the masters of suspense.”

  —Sherrilyn Kenyon, New York Times bestselling author

  “Novak’s skillful blend of poignantly real characters and gut-gripping suspense captures your heart on page one.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Karen Rose

  Also by

  BRENDA NOVAK

  TRUST ME

  DEAD RIGHT

  DEAD GIVEAWAY

  DEAD SILENCE

  COLD FEET

  TAKING THE HEAT

  EVERY WAKING MOMENT

  STOP ME

  BRENDA NOVAK

  To Lieutenant James Hendrickson (Mr. Incredible) of the Sacramento Police Department, who took me to work, gave me the grand tour and generously answered every crime-related question I could think of. It’s comforting to know that there are Super Heroes like you out there on the front lines.

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome to The Last Stand, where victims fight back. Jasmine Stratford, the heroine of this novel, is one of three women who began The Last Stand in order to make a difference in the community—but also because she couldn’t get over her own brush with evil. What happened sixteen years ago drives her to fight for every lost child, every kidnap victim, every missing person. With each new case, she’s trying to “bring her sister home,” hoping to achieve the closure she’s never had. But when a new development in her sister’s case takes her to Cajun Louisiana and a dark hero intent on nursing his own wounds, her own life hangs in the balance.

  In the first book of this series (Trust Me), you met Skye Kellerman. She’s still involved in The Last Stand, still fighting for the rights of the victims of violent crime. So is Jasmine’s other partner, Sheridan Kohl. You’ll learn more about Sheridan in Watch Me, the next book in this series.

  Please visit www.brendanovak.com, where you can take a virtual tour of the offices of The Last Stand, read a prologue that doesn’t appear anywhere else, download a free screen saver for signing up on my mailing list, read interesting interviews with police and other crime fighters in my Crimebeat blog, browse through merchandise with the “The Last Stand: Where Victims Fight Back” logo, enter my monthly draws for mystery boxes and other prizes and check out the items in my annual Online Auction for Diabetes Research. The diabetes auction is my own passion, my own effort to give back. Together with my fans, author friends and publishing contacts, I’ve raised over $350,000 to help those, like my son, who struggle with this disease.

  I love to hear from my readers, so feel free to e-mail me via my Web site. For those who don’t have e-mail access, please write to P.O. Box 3781, Citrus Heights, CA 95611.

  Be smart and stay safe!

  Brenda Novak

  Battle not with monsters lest ye become a monster and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes into you.

  —Friedrich Nietzsche

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  PROLOGUE

  New Orleans

  Four years ago…

  The man who’d murdered Romain Fornier’s ten-year-old daughter didn’t look like a killer. He sat slumped in the courtroom with puffy bags beneath his eyes, a halo of mousy brown hair circling his otherwise bald head and jowls that hung lower than his chin. There were moments when even Romain couldn’t believe frumpy, middle-aged Francis Moreau had done something so vicious, moments when he glanced back over the days and weeks since Adele’s abduction and felt as if he was living someone else’s life.

  The way the case had been going this morning, Romain had a feeling the nightmare was about to get worse.

  The judge pounded his gavel, bringing the noise in the courtroom to an abrupt halt. It grew so quiet Romain could hear the defense counsel shuffling his papers.

  “The law is very precise on this matter,” the judge announced. “The police may have obtained verbal approval from the proper authority, but they didn’t get the affidavit signed until after their search of the defendant’s home, which means the evidence found in that search is not admissible in court.”

  Romain heard the gasps of his family. His parents sat on one side of him, his sister on the other. Without that evidence, we don’t have a case. The D.A. had said that over and over.

  Romain leaned forward to whisper to Detective Huff, who sat a row in front of him. “Is this as bad as it seems?”

  “Don’t worry,” Huff whispered back. But his voice sounded odd, almost strangled, and his expression didn’t promote much confidence. When a witness for the defense revealed that Huff had searched Moreau’s house without the correct paperwork, Huff’s face had flushed crimson. It was still crimson and several beads of sweat had popped out on his forehead.

  Although he felt desperate to make sense of what was happening, Romain was nonetheless distracted when the prosecutor asked to approach the bench. The judge waved both him and the defense counsel forward. They kept their conversation muted, but the way the D.A. gesticulate
d with his hands suggested he was in the middle of a heated argument.

  This case couldn’t get away from them now, not when there was no doubt they had the right man, Romain told himself. But the D.A. didn’t seem happy when he finally returned to his table. Before sitting down, he searched the crowd, singling out Huff, whom he gave a look of such contempt Romain could hardly breathe.

  “They’re going to let him off,” Romain said to no one in particular. His sister sat like a statue; his mother was crying, his father trying to comfort her. “He’s going to get off!” he repeated, and this time he gripped Huff by the shoulder to guarantee a response.

  Huff twisted around to face him. A fan hummed in the corner. The air-conditioning had been out for two days and the weather had turned unseasonably warm for October. “He did it, Romain,” he said, mopping his forehead with a handkerchief. “I saw the tape.”

  Romain had seen part of the tape, too—as much as he could bear to watch. Which was why he couldn’t understand this. How could the technicalities involved in serving a search warrant take precedence over a child’s life? His child’s life?

  “They can’t let him walk,” Romain said. But the judge pounded his gavel, curtly announced that the D.A. was dropping all charges and exited the courtroom.

  Stunned, Romain stood with his mouth agape as Moreau’s watery blue eyes cut to him and a victorious smile curved his lips. The sight of it made everything around Romain go black. For a few seconds, there were only the two of them, staring across the courtroom at each other.

  “It’s the detective’s fault?” his mother was asking. “Why didn’t he get the affidavit signed before he searched?”

  “Moreau knew the police had been tipped off. He would’ve destroyed the evidence if Detective Huff had waited,” his father said.

  Huff must’ve heard them, but he kept facing forward. He was staring at Moreau, too, whose attention and “you lose” smile had shifted to the detective. Then the defense attorneys started shaking Moreau’s hand, congratulating him.

  The crowd surged toward the door. Romain’s sister pulled on his arm, trying to get him to follow her. But he was rooted to the spot. The judge and the lawyers had to come back. This wasn’t over. It couldn’t be over. Moreau was a killer. He’d murdered a child. Romain’s child. And he’d do it again.

  Romain wasn’t sure how he eventually got out of the courtroom. He didn’t remember making the decision to leave, walking toward the exit or passing through to the outside. He only remembered seeing the detective remove his jacket and swing it over his arm as they descended the steps—and sensing the presence of Huff’s gun in its holster as they moved side by side, jostled by the crowd and attacked by the media, who waited like a pack of wolves.

  “Mr. Fornier, what do you have to say about seeing the man who allegedly killed your daughter go free?”

  “Mr. Fornier! Mr. Fornier! Do you still believe Francis Moreau murdered Adele?”

  “Can you tell me if you’ll pursue this in a civil proceeding?”

  As one reporter after another shoved a microphone into Romain’s face, he saw Moreau a few feet away, pandering to the cameras—and suddenly craved the feel of a gun in his hand more than his next breath. He was an excellent marksman. At this distance, he’d scarcely have to aim. One pull of the trigger and he could fix the terrible mistake that had just been made.

  And the next thing Romain knew, he heard a blast, Moreau fell to the ground and Detective Huff began forcing him to the hot, gritty concrete.

  CHAPTER 1

  Sacramento, California

  The present…

  When Jasmine Stratford opened the package, she was standing in the middle of a crowded mall. Suddenly she couldn’t hear a single sound. The laughing, the talking, the click-clack of shoes on the colorful floor, the Christmas music that’d been playing in the background—it all disappeared as her ears began to ring.

  “What is it?” Sheridan Kohl touched her arm, eyebrows gathered in concern.

  The words came to Jasmine as if from a great distance, but she couldn’t speak. Her lungs worked frantically, but her chest felt so tight she couldn’t expand her diaphragm. Sweat trickled down her spine, causing her crisp cotton blouse to stick to her as she stared at the silver-and-pink bracelet she’d just pulled from the small cardboard box.

  “What is it, Jaz?” Still frowning, her friend took the bracelet from Jasmine’s cold fingers. As she read the name spelled out in silver letters separated by pink beads, her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, God!” she murmured, pressing a hand to her chest.

  Jasmine’s head spun. Afraid she might pass out, she reached for Sheridan, who helped her to the center of the mall and asked a man sitting in one of the few seats to move.

  He collected the shopping bags piled at his feet and jumped up, allowing Jasmine to sink onto the hard plastic chair.

  “Hey, she no looking good, eh? She sick or somet’ing?” he asked.

  “She’s just suffered a terrible shock,” Sheridan explained.

  The words floated over Jasmine as if they’d been written in the air, each letter flying past her, meaningless. Her nervous system seemed to be shutting down. Overload. Rejection of current input. Inability to cope.

  “Don’t move,” Sheridan barked and put the bracelet back in the box on her lap. “I’ll get you something to drink.”

  Jasmine couldn’t have moved even if she wanted to. Her rubbery legs refused to support her weight, or she would’ve walked out of the mall. People were beginning to stare.

  “What’s wrong?” someone murmured, pausing near the Mexican man who was still watching her curiously.

  “I don’t know, but she no look good, eh?” he repeated.

  A teenage boy ventured closer. “Are you okay, lady?”

  “Maybe someone should call the paramedics,” a woman said.

  Wave them away. But Jasmine’s thoughts were so focused on what was in her lap, she couldn’t even raise her hand. She’d made that bracelet as a gift for her little sister. She remembered Kimberly’s delight when she’d unwrapped it on her eighth birthday, her last birthday before the tall man with the beard entered their house in Cleveland one sunny afternoon and took her away.

  Jasmine’s mind veered from the memories. Until she was twelve, she’d led such a safe and happy life she’d never dreamed she would encounter a threat in her own home. Strangers were people outside on the street. This man had acted like one of her father’s workers, whose faces changed so often she wasn’t familiar with them all. They were always coming to the house to pick up equipment for his satellite TV business, to get a check, to drop off some paperwork. Occasionally he hired vagrants to organize his warehouse or build a fence or even clean up the yard. In any event, she’d believed their visitor was a nice guy.

  Heaven help her, she’d believed he was nice. And she’d let it happen….

  “You want I should call an ambulance?” the Mexican man ventured.

  Jasmine had to cover her mouth so the screams inside her didn’t escape. Breathe deeply. Get hold of yourself. After nearly destroying each other with their bitterness and grief, her parents had given up hope. But she’d kept a candle burning deep inside. And now this…

  Sheridan returned and nudged her way through the four or five people who were watching to see if Jasmine would rally. “I’ve got her. Everything’s fine,” she told them, and they began to drift off, but not without a backward glance. “Drink this,” she said.

  The freshly squeezed lemonade tasted reassuringly normal.

  A man seated next to them stood and offered Sheridan his chair. She thanked him and perched on the edge of it.

  After a few minutes, Jasmine’s breathing and heart rate slowed. Still, she was damp with sweat and when she tried to talk tears slipped down her cheeks.

  “It’s okay.” Putting an arm around her, Sheridan squeezed her shoulders. “Take all the time you need.”

  Jasmine appreciated her friend’s empathy, but now t
hat the shock was wearing off she had so many questions. Who had sent the bracelet? Why after so long? What’d happened to her sister? And the biggest question of all—was there any chance that Kimberly was still alive?

  “I’m so sorry I brought that package with me, that you had to deal with this in a public setting.” Sheridan’s expression revealed her chagrin. “When I saw it sitting on the reception desk with the rest of the mail, I thought it might be something you’ve been waiting for. I knew you weren’t planning on coming into the office today so I was…” she shrugged helplessly “…trying to be helpful.”

  Jasmine wiped her eyes. “It’s okay. Of course you’d never expect anything like this.”

  “Who sent it?”

  “I don’t know.” She studied the box. There was no return address. There wasn’t even a note, just some crumpled packaging material—

  Jasmine’s pulse spiked. Wait a minute… There was something written on one of the papers that’d been wadded up.

  Careful not to tear the note or get her fingerprints all over it, she flattened it out—and saw two words printed in what appeared to be blood: Stop me.

  * * *

  That night, Jasmine hovered over the phone. Should she tell her parents about the bracelet? She couldn’t decide. According to the cancellation stamp, the package had been sent from New Orleans, but she didn’t know if she’d ever be able to glean more information than that. She was reluctant to open old wounds—and yet, her folks had a right to the information, didn’t they? Would they want to know?

  She picked up the handset. Her father would. After the bearded man took Kimberly, Peter Stratford had become so single-minded in his quest to find his youngest daughter that he’d eventually lost everything—his business, his wife, his home. He’d searched until he’d nearly driven himself mad. Searched until everyone else in his life, including Jasmine, had become nothing more than shadows. Even then he’d given up only because he had no choice. There was nowhere else to go, nothing more he could do.