Targeted

by Lori L. Harris

  If she could just concentrate on the heavy, steady beat. If she could just stay here. In the dark. In these strong arms. She would be okay.

  “Police,” a man’s voice called from the foyer.

  She felt Alec moving away from her, physically and emotionally. Her fingers squeezed the material of his sleeve. If she let him go, she didn’t know what would happen.

  “In here,” Alec called. “In the kitchen.”

  Heavy footsteps moved down the hall. Flashlight beams stabbed and probed until they found them. The light switch, a relic from the twenties, made a sharp click.

  Three men, Police Chief Jack Blade and two young deputies whose names she didn’t know, stood in the doorway.

  Squinting against the sudden glare, she pushed herself off Alec’s lap and onto the floor, wincing as broken glass bit into her palm. She kept her eyes averted, was afraid that, if she looked at any of the men who now stared at her, she’d lose the little bit of self-control that she’d managed to regain over the past few minutes.

  “Katie?”

  Looking up, she realized Alec was on his feet now, and was offering her a hand up. His face was grim. For the first time she registered the shoulder holster and the gun. She’d never seen him with a weapon of any sort, so she was put off by it. Which was really ridiculous, considering what had happened tonight. When his warm fingers closed over her frigid ones, she realized that even that small contact made her feel safer.

  Once she was standing, he kept a hand locked around her arm as if he didn’t trust her to stay on her feet. And maybe he was right to, because she felt woozy.

  “You out riding patrols tonight?” Alec asked his brother.

  “No. Just in the area when the call came in.” Chief Blade looked at Katie. “Do you want a ride to the hospital?”

  “No. I’m fine.” She touched the side of her face, testing the soreness. Well, maybe not fine, but the hospital was still out. She hated anything to do with them.

  The chief nudged the closest officer—a young kid who looked as if he should still be in high school. “Take the front door. I don’t want anyone coming in until Martinez is done processing the scene.” His glance skipped to the second officer. “Fitz, get some more manpower over here to check the neighborhood. I want everyone who’s available.” As the man walked away, he added, “And get the pizza box and flowers off the front porch. Throw them both on my floorboard.”

  The police chief swung his attention back to his brother. “I’m assuming you brought both?”

  Alec ignored his brother’s question. “I’m not sure how he got in, but he went out through that door.” He nodded toward the still open back one. “I went after him, so you’ll find my shoeprints out there, too.”

  The police chief frowned. “Did you check the other rooms?”

  “No. I figured you’d be showing up soon enough. That the fewer people walking through the house, possibly disturbing evidence, the better. You’ll find a couple of bullets meant for me near the dining room entrance and my fingerprints from the front door on through to the kitchen.”

  “Martinez will need comparison prints.”

  “Whenever he wants them.” Alec lifted Katie’s right hand. “He’ll probably want to check out her fingernails just in case some of that blood belongs to the suspect.” He let her hand go. She wished he hadn’t.

  Chief Blade gave a sharp nod. “Helpful, as always, Alec.” There was an edge to his voice that Katie didn’t understand. But then she didn’t know him. Maybe it was the situation. Situation? Now there was a euphemism for what had happened to her.

  Once she was seated on the sofa, Alec brought her a glass of water. Glancing down, she caught sight of her black and blue left knee and felt the first hard throb of pain.

  It was as if her body was a computer that had been shut down, but now booted up, each program reporting its status at regular intervals. Now the face. Now the neck. And now the knee. She suspected the worst was yet to come.

  And not just physically. There would be questions. Ones that she would find difficult to answer.

  Jack pulled up a chair opposite while Alec chose to stand at the foyer door. As irrational as it sounded, she would have liked to have Alec sitting next to her while his brother asked his questions, but didn’t know how to make the request without appearing needy.

  Who was she trying to kid? She was needy. But she could handle her own neediness.

  The police chief waited until she swung her gaze back to him. Jack Blade was younger than Alec by a few years, and with his blond hair, he looked more like a lifeguard than a lawman. She had heard rumors that he’d worked undercover in a big city before he’d come to Deep Water. But Deep Water’s rumor mill was wrong more often than right. She only had to look at what they said about her to know that.

  “Katie, I need you to start at the beginning and tell me everything you can remember.”

  She nodded, but swallowed roughly. Her neck and throat hurt from the choke hold.

  “Any possibility that you know your attacker? Have you ever seen him before?”

  She shook her head. “No. At least I don’t think so.”

  “When you came home, was he already in the house?”

  “Yes. But I don’t know where. Maybe in my bedroom. Or in the hall closet.” She ducked her head. Not meeting his eyes made it easier to talk about. “He…he came up behind me while I was at the kitchen sink and…. and—” She couldn’t seem to go on. When the police chief reached out to touch her in a comforting gesture, she moved her hand just beyond his reach.

  He acted as if he hadn’t noticed the movement, but she knew he had. “Take your time. There’s no hurry.”

  She nodded her understanding. Instead of easier, she was finding it more difficult to control her emotions. Maybe it was due to the adrenaline. But she didn’t like the way she was right now. She didn’t want to be this person.

  “He wanted…” He wanted to kill her. She still couldn’t believe it, but it had to be true. There was no other explanation. “I got away. Made it to the back door. But he’d taken the key.”

  After taking a small sip of water, just enough to moisten her tongue, she managed to continue. “I used a chair to break the glass. He…he got to me before…I could get out. He dragged me into the hall.”

  She turned to Alec. “That’s when you showed up.”

  “Any chance you might recognize him if you saw him again?” the police chief asked.

  “Maybe.” She heard the doubt in her own voice, and realized that she was shaking her head slowly. “I’m not sure, it…was dark. He didn’t really allow me to see his face.”

  “I understand. Was he tall? Big?”

  “Both,” she said, thinking about the hard mass of his body.

  Alec straightened in the doorway, but kept his arms folded. “He was six-one or two, probably went two-twenty or more.”

  “You got a look at him?” Chief Blade asked his brother.

  “Not a very long one, and, as Katie said, it was dark.”

  Chief Blade turned his attention back to her. “Caucasian?”

  She nodded. “I think so.”

  “But you’re not sure?”

  “No. Maybe if he hadn’t been wearing gloves.”

  “Tell me about the gloves.”

  “They were latex. The kind doctors wear.” She hugged her arms across her middle and tried not to think about how his gloved hand had closed over her throat.

  “How about his voice? Did he say anything?”

  “He called me—” She broke off to take a deep breath. God. She didn’t want to think about what that meant.

  “What did he call you?” Jack prompted.

  “Katydid,” she answered softly. As she waited for his next question, she studied the glass of water she held. She was okay. She was in control. She was a big fat liar.

  “Katydid? Is that a nickname?”

  “Yes.” She nodded. “Karen, my twin sister, gave it to me.”

/>   “Is she the only one who uses it?”

  “My father did sometimes.”

  “Anyone else?”

  She didn’t want to say his name. Even inside her head, she’d been avoiding it. Because saying the name aloud would make it too real.

  “Katie, did anyone else call you by that name?” Chief Blade asked again, his voice still kind, but slightly louder this time. As if he thought the reason she’d failed to answer him was because she hadn’t heard the question.

  She nodded again. “Carlos Bricker. My ex-boyfriend. He’d use it to upset me.”

  “Why would it upset you?”

  “My sister…she’s dead.”

  He seemed to study her face. For the first time, she wondered what he saw when he looked at her. The side of her face ached from where she’d hit the wall. She was probably pretty bruised. When she talked, there was a searing pain on the left side of her lower lip, which probably meant it was busted.

  What he saw…what anyone looking at her would see was the face of a victim. The demeanor of a victim. And she hated that even more than her physical appearance.

  “Katie?”

  For a second, she couldn’t remember what they’d been talking about, then it came to her. About her sister. About the nickname.

  “No one besides your family and Carlos knew about the nickname?” the police chief repeated.

  She took another sip of water and hoped no one would notice her tears. “No.” Admitting defeat, she wiped them off with her hands.

  “When was the last time you saw Carlos?”

  “A little over two months ago. I had just broken off the relationship and told him I was moving my paintings to another gallery. When I went to get them, he’d locked them up.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I hired an attorney. But Carlos called later that same night. Evidently, my attorney had already contacted him. Carlos said that I’d regret my decision. I assumed he meant professionally.” She took a deep breath. “Three nights later, he was waiting for me when I got home. I didn’t see him until it was too late. I wouldn’t have gotten out of my car if I had. He tried to drag me inside the condo. When a neighbor came out, Carlos took off. The neighbor never got a good look at him, though.” She swallowed. “I filed charges. He produced a witness who said he was with her when the attack happened. The charges were dropped. I moved up here.”

  “So you believe Carlos Bricker hired someone to harm you?”

  “Yes.” She rubbed her forehead. Her head was really beginning to ache. Which wasn’t a bad thing. If it hurt enough, she wouldn’t be able to think anymore.

  Chief Blade turned his attention to his brother. “Okay, Alec. What can you add to Katie’s statement?”

  “He’s right-handed and knows how to handle a gun. Either military or police training, or maybe he’s just heavy into weaponry. He placed two shots within inches of each other and over my head in a darkened house. Right-handed because of where he was standing at the time he fired and the trajectory of the rounds. My guess is a 9 mm auto. The fact he didn’t panic suggests he’s been in similar situations.”

  At that moment, the young deputy at the door let in a man dressed in jeans and a T-shirt emblazoned with the words Grateful Dead. He had a short, neatly trimmed and nearly black beard. A tape measure rode his belt and he carried a large leather case. Just inside the door, he stopped to pull paper covers over running shoes—the kind doctors and nurses used in the operating room—then looked toward the living room and his boss.

  “Martinez, I think you know my brother,” the police chief nodded at Alec, then motioned with a hand toward Katie. “This is Katie Carroll.”

  Katie managed a weak smile and received a nod from the young Hispanic man.

  The police chief stood. “I’ll have more questions, Katie, after I’ve had a chance to look around. We’ll need the clothes you’re wearing. I’ll get you some to change into in a minute, but for now, try to relax. We’ll try to get through here as fast as we can.” He looked at his brother. “Perhaps you could get a list of anyone who may have been through the house recently. We’re going to need to get their prints, too, for elimination.”

  He joined the technician in the foyer and they moved into the back hallway and the kitchen.

  Alec sat in the chair Jack had vacated. “I know you said no to the hospital, but you really should go and get checked out.” He reached out, pushed the hair away from her left cheek, his concerned eyes briefly studying the bruising. “I’d like to be able to tell you that it looks better than it feels, but I’m afraid the opposite is true.” His smile was small, patient and fleeting. “You could have a minor concussion. And if nothing else, the doctor could give you something to help you sleep.”

  Sleep? She didn’t think she’d be doing that anytime soon.

  She struggled with a small smile of her own, one she intended to make her appear stronger than she was feeling. “I’m okay. Or will be when this is over.”

  “Shouldn’t take much longer,” he assured her, repeating his brother’s words.

  She nodded. “The idea that someone hates me enough to want me dead…” She shook her head slowly. “I think it would be easier if I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Because then I could tell myself that it had nothing to do with me.”

  She was starting to feel flat. As if she’d been up too long and was suffering from sleep deprivation. Able to function, but not very well.

  Alec removed a small notepad from the inside pocket of his jacket. “It’s just the adrenaline. It’s not unusual to feel high one moment and then the next start to feel tired. Perhaps while you’re still up to it, we should make that list of who’s been inside the house.”

  She placed the glass of water on the table in front of her. “When you first busted in here, you yelled FBI.”

  “I was with the FBI. I’m not any longer.” He didn’t allow her to comment. “Who has access to your home?”

  Because of the way he’d answered and how he seemed to want to brush by his past employment, she figured something had happened. That or he was anxious to fulfill his duties and leave. She wasn’t looking forward to that moment.

  “He was wearing gloves.”

  “But we can’t be certain how long he’d been in the house. He may have removed them at some point.”

  She recalled the candlelight in her bedroom. Maybe he was right. Perhaps her attacker had removed his gloves to light them.

  “Just the landlord. I think he hired an electrician to fix the electric panel box in the kitchen, but you’ll need to check with him.”

  “We’ll be asking him these same questions. How about friends? Coworkers?”

  She lifted her gaze to his. “No. I’ve mostly kept to myself.” Tonight was to have been the first foray into dat ing since she’d moved up here. She’d seen it as the beginning. A new start with new friends—a brand-new life where anything was possible. She liked Deep Water. Liked the people even more. They seemed less complicated than her Miami friends. More genuine.

  She should have known it wasn’t going to work.

  Alec ripped out the page. “If you think of anyone else who’s been through here, be sure to tell Jack.”

  When he started to stand, she stopped him with a hand on his jacket sleeve. “Thanks. For everything.”

  “You’re welcome.” He smiled, and this time his eyes seemed warmer. “For everything.”

  Her hand still rested on his arm. She was trying to work up the courage to ask him to stay with her for a few minutes more when Jack returned.

  Self-conscious, she withdrew her hand, and as she did, Alec stood.

  She swung her gaze toward Alec’s brother. The police chief refused to meet it.

  “Alec, you need to take a look at this.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s the bedroom.”

  Katie started to get to her feet. Alec’s hand resting on her shoulder kept her seated.

  “Why don
’t you stay put for now?”

  Chapter Three

  Crime scene technician Andy Martinez stood in front of what Alec assumed to be the door to Katie’s bedroom. He appeared to check the settings on the video camera he held. A 35 mm hung on his shoulder.

  He glanced at his watch, and Alec wanted to ask him where he needed to be, but it wasn’t any of his business. Maybe he had a hot date, or a wife to get home to. But the action reminded Alec that he’d also had other plans for tonight. He checked the time. Passengers would be embarking in twenty-five minutes, which meant he’d have to catch a flight in the morning.

  “I’ll shoot the video first, and then get the stills. Then bag up.” Martinez pulled a large pad and a pencil from a side compartment of his case. “Anyone here want to do the sketch? I flunked first grade art. Never could get the arms and legs the same length on those stick figures.”

  He didn’t know Martinez, but thought the kid seemed a bit nervous. As if something in the room had made him uncomfortable.

  Jack motioned for Martinez to step away from the closed door. “That can wait a few minutes.”

  Alec looked at his brother, at the closed door Jack stood in front of. “I take it you found something out of the ordinary?”

  “Depends on which town you’re in.” With a grim expression, Jack nudged the door open.

  Candlelight reached every corner of the small space. Not that anyone stepping inside would notice the candles, considering the rest of the room.

  There were no pillows on the double bed, no top sheet, either. Just the fitted bottom sheet. The center of the bed was strewn with a path of red rose petals, as if flung there by a flower girl following a bride down the aisle. The remaining roses—at least two dozen—filled a vase on the dresser.

  A seduction scene. If you could ignore the surgical tubing tied to the headboard. And the looped ends that could be quickly slipped around wrists and ankles, and which would only become tighter as the victim struggled. Since there was no footboard, the tubing had been attached to the legs of the Hollywood bed frame. Square knots, again, tied by a right-hander.