Killer Heat

by Brenda Novak

  Although he was braced for the worst, the impact rattled his teeth, especially when the air bag went off. It sounded like a shotgun as it punched him in the face. The resulting powder and gases burned his face and arms, but the bag had stopped him from cracking his skull on the windshield, which was what would’ve happened when the sudden deceleration threw him forward.

  Dazed, he blinked several times, trying to clear his vision.

  Steam rose from the van’s engine. Something must’ve gone through the radiator. Jonah could hear the hiss. He just couldn’t figure out where he was—until he heard the feverish growling of a dog.

  Butch.

  Demon.

  Francesca.

  The thought of Demon mauling Francesca brought him out of his stupor. He had to get to her. That was why he’d crashed the gate.

  Grabbing the door handle, he jerked it up to release the latch, but it wouldn’t open. He had to crank down the window and crawl through it instead.

  Move! Now!

  Scrambling faster than he was really capable of after such a blow, he fell as he cleared the window and banged his knee on a sharp object. It hurt like hell, but he ignored the pain and got to his feet.

  “Hey!” Trying to attract the dog’s attention, he flapped his arms as he ran. There was some action taking place about twenty feet away. He could hear the scuffle, see some figures, but thanks to the shadows cast by the pole lights and the black spots that danced in his vision from the crash, he couldn’t be sure what was going on.

  “Demon!” Butch called.

  Was Butch urging the dog on or trying to call him off? Jonah couldn’t tell. But if Butch was trying to stop Demon, the Doberman was too worked up to listen. He veered away from Francesca, but came bounding toward Jonah, teeth bared in a snarl, legs working in a fluid motion as he began to jump.

  “Demon!” Butch cried again.

  At this point, Jonah was fairly certain he was trying to call the dog off. But it was too late. Demon was already in the air, lunging for Jonah’s throat…

  With just a split second to react, Jonah had only one choice.

  Drawing his gun from his shoulder harness, he fired.

  The sound of the gunshot nearly deafened Francesca. Yet she managed to hear Butch’s gut-wrenching reaction.

  “You killed my dog!” he screamed as Demon fell to the earth.

  Closing her eyes, Francesca held her injured arm against her body and murmured a silent prayer of thanks. She’d been bitten when she tried to protect her neck and face but, fortunately, Jonah had smashed into the salvage yard before Demon could make another attempt at her jugular. Two or three more minutes, and she’d be the one lying motionless on the ground.

  “You k-killed your dog,” she corrected, but she was shaking so badly she couldn’t stay on her feet and sank to the ground.

  Butch whirled on her as if he’d finish her off himself, and Jonah fired his gun again. Since he was aiming at the sky, the bullet went into the air above them, but the threat was clear enough to convince Butch that he’d better back off.

  “You bitch! Why did you come back here?” he cried. “What’s wrong with you? Why won’t you leave me alone? What have I ever done to you? I’ve told you and told you, I didn’t kill April Bonner! I’ve never killed anyone!”

  Blinking fast to stop the tears that flowed of their own accord, Francesca gulped for the breath to speak. “You j-just t-tried to k-kill me.”

  “That’s not true! The dog must’ve smelled you, because he took off on his own. I tried to stop him. It’s not my fault if you won’t obey the signs. There are Beware of Dog notices all over this place!”

  Nauseous and weak, Francesca laid her head on her knees. “You sicced him on me, and you know it.”

  “Butch?”

  Evidently, the blast of Jonah’s gun had brought Paris to the porch. Hovering on the top step, she clutched one of the support posts as if she was afraid to come any closer. But afraid of what? Jonah’s gun? Or her husband’s reaction? “Butch, what’s wrong?” she asked, her voice reed-thin. “What was that shot about?”

  “They killed Demon,” he called. “They shot him!”

  “Get in the van,” Jonah told Francesca, and jerked his head toward it.

  Francesca wasn’t sure the van was drivable. It looked pretty banged up. But she didn’t argue. Wanting to get out of the salvage yard, she gathered her strength, got to her feet and limped past the inert body of the Doberman.

  “You’re in trouble, Butch,” she heard Jonah say as she reached the passenger side and climbed in. “Serious trouble.”

  “She’s the one who’s in trouble,” he insisted. “I’m going to get a restraining order against her. She has to stop harassing us. I was nice enough to return her purse when I found it, and this is the thanks I get?”

  “Wow, he ran the gate.” This came from someone else, someone who sounded emotionally removed.

  Swiping at her wet eyes, Francesca ducked her head to see through Jonah’s open window. Dean stood on the porch beside his sister, and from the tone of his voice, he thought this was good fun instead of upsetting and dangerous.

  Paris was too worried about her husband to react to Dean. “Butch, come here. Don’t say a word. We’ll get a lawyer. They can’t do this. They can’t come onto our property, wreck our fence and kill our dog. We didn’t do anything to them. They’re going to pay for this.”

  Butch didn’t seem reassured by his wife’s solace. He was too focused on Demon. “You had no right,” he told Jonah as he knelt and lifted the dog’s body into his arms. “You had no right to even be here.”

  “Go get the video camera,” Paris told Dean, and he hurried off.

  Hugging herself to control the shaking, Francesca cringed at the thought of anyone recording the van sitting wrecked in the yard, Butch’s dog dead, tears streaking down everyone’s faces. She knew how it would look. The video wouldn’t show Butch purposely locking her in and ordering his dog to attack her.

  Something wet and sticky dripped onto her leg. Blood. She hadn’t realized she was bleeding but of course she would be. Demon had chomped down on her arm and refused to let go.

  To staunch the flow, she wrapped the bottom of her shirt around her injured forearm. She shouldn’t have come here. She’d wanted to stop a killer, but she’d only made the situation worse. Even Jonah was hurt. He favored his right leg as he backed cautiously away from Butch.

  “Get me the purse you took,” he said when he reached the front grille of the van. “And this time don’t say you don’t have it. I saw you bring it to your family.”

  Burying his face in his dog’s fur, Butch ignored him.

  “Now!” Jonah shouted. “Unless you and your entire family want to be arrested, you’ll get the damn purse.”

  It was Paris who moved. She went inside and returned with Francesca’s handbag. Dean followed closely behind her with the video, narrating as he filmed. “Demon is dead,” he said. “And this is the man who shot him.”

  “I’m calling the cops,” Paris yelled as she threw the purse at Jonah’s feet.

  “You do that.” He gathered up the items that fell out before coming around to the driver’s side of the van.

  “I’m sorry. I— This was such a mistake,” Francesca said as he got in.

  He made no comment. “You okay?”

  She wiped her wet cheeks again. “I think I might need a few stitches.”

  “How many times did he bite you?”

  “J-just once.” She couldn’t seem to stop her teeth from chattering. “I don’t know how bad it is. I c-can’t see well enough in this light. B-but it hurts.”

  “Let’s hope he’s had all his shots.” As he turned the key in the ignition, the starter made a grinding sound but the engine didn’t catch. Pumping the gas pedal, he tried again.

  “What—what about you?” Worried, she watched him closely. “You’re injured, t-too.”

  “It’s nothing. I’m fine. Let’s get out of
here and find you some help.” The van’s engine finally revved, but it died and wouldn’t start again, which meant they had to endure the red-hot glares of Butch and Paris, and more filming from Dean, as they waited for an ambulance.

  “Dogs are more dangerous than cats. But some cats can surprise you,” Dean said, as if anyone wanted to hear what he had to say.

  Was that the meds talking? Francesca wondered as she struggled to recover from the shock and adrenaline rush of what she’d just been through. How could Dean be going on about cats in the aftermath of everything that’d taken place?

  The paramedics and the police arrived at virtually the same time, and Francesca heard Butch’s version while she received medical attention. He spun a fabricated story, but Paris and even Dean backed him up. His in-laws were in the yard by then, too, playing up their grief over the dog, although it wouldn’t be dead if not for its owner, and venting their outrage at what had happened for the benefit of Dean’s camera.

  “I can’t believe this,” Francesca grumbled to Jonah. She felt like a rag doll, so spent she had no energy left to argue her case.

  Jonah was refusing to let one of the paramedics look at his knee. “Ignore it,” he said to her.

  She wished she could. But Finch and Hunsacker were glaring at her with such rancor that she knew this wouldn’t end well.

  Butch screamed that he planned to go on television and alert the public to the “abuses” he’d suffered and how the police and their “representatives” had infringed on his rights. No doubt the county investigators felt she’d jeopardized the reputation of the sheriff’s office, as well as the integrity of the investigation.

  Or had Hunsacker told Butch to slip that ace up his sleeve?

  It was an insidious thought, but Francesca couldn’t help recalling Finch’s earlier words, when he’d expressed concern that Butch might sue the department. Had he and Hunsacker discussed it, too? She knew from what she’d overheard Paris say earlier that Hunsacker was doing a little coaching on the side. Maybe he was actively working against the investigation….

  That idea was so disconcerting she hated to even consider it. This case was difficult enough to solve.

  “You hanging in there?” Jonah touched her shoulder as the paramedics loaded her into the ambulance.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ll have Finch drop me off at the hospital.”

  With a nod, she closed her eyes.

  It wasn’t until later, after she’d received a tetanus shot and twenty-four stitches and had been released from the emergency room, that she remembered the panties. Jonah was waiting for her in the lobby but, at that point, she wasn’t sure she wanted to tell anyone she’d taken them from the yard. Her actions had caused enough problems for one night. So, hoping that what Paris had said about “Julia” might make a difference, she told him everything she’d overheard at the salvage yard but left out one small detail—that she might have possession of physical evidence. She didn’t want to see how he’d react to learning she’d taken something that would now be inadmissible in court.

  Seeing the Department 6 number on his call display, Jonah rolled out of bed and hit the answer button but carried his phone into the motel bathroom before saying hello. It was past eight, but he wanted to let Francesca sleep as long as possible. The emergency room had been so packed last night they hadn’t gotten to bed until after two.

  “What have you got for me?” he asked whoever was on the phone.

  “Shit. It was right here. Where’d it go?” Nate Ferrentino. Although Nate wasn’t generally on desk duty, Jonah recognized his friend’s voice. They both preferred being in the field, doing undercover work or, at the very least, some good old-fashioned, beat-the-pavement investigating. But Nate’s wife, Rachel, another operative at Department 6, was due to have their second son any day, and Nate wasn’t about to risk missing the big event. Jonah hadn’t seen him so excited since a little over a year ago, when they’d had their first child. He wouldn’t go anywhere if he couldn’t reach her within fifteen minutes.

  Fortunately, the office was close to home. They were currently short-staffed in Los Angeles and needed some backup for the operatives who were on assignment. Milton Berger, the owner of the company, was opening an extension office in Tucson with Roderick Guerrero, Jonah’s closest friend in the company, and was spending most of his time there.

  “Here it is.” Nate came back on the line. “I don’t know how it wound up clear over there.”

  “You’re not much of a secretary,” Jonah said.

  “I’m not a secretary at all, so kiss my ass,” he responded.

  Jonah chuckled. “How’s Rach?”

  “Uncomfortable and impatient. She’s also eating me out of house and home. But that’s to be expected at eight and a half months. It happened last pregnancy, too.”

  “Dylan ready for his new brother?”

  “Hell, yeah. Now he’ll have someone to pound on.”

  They hadn’t planned on having children only sixteen months apart, but they didn’t seem unhappy about it. “With the size of that kid, I feel sorry for the new arrival.” Picturing Rachel as he’d last seen her, looking swollen and harried as she dragged Dylan through the office in search of his father, Jonah continued to smile. “You sure you’re ready to do this all over again?”

  “You kidding? There’s nothing like it, man. Someday you’ll understand.”

  Jonah’s thoughts reverted to Summer, as they so often did. But this time it was as if he was standing in that hospital room ten years ago, smelling the sweet scent of a brand-new baby. His baby. Although it was something he never talked about, he already knew what having a child was like. But that moment, the one that was supposed to be so special, had turned into an ache that would never heal. Not only had he let Francesca down, and Adriana, too—he’d known she wanted far more from him than he’d been willing to give her—he hadn’t been there for his own child. He’d opted to go the convenient route.

  Little had he known how inconvenient giving her up would become for his conscience. “Someday maybe I will,” he said. “What do you have on Dean Wheeler?”

  “Quite a bit, actually. The man’s spent the better part of his life navigating the mental health system.”

  Relieved by the change of subject, Jonah straightened his shoulders and tried, once again, to close the door on his past. “I’d guessed as much. But has he ever been treated at Laurel Oaks Behavioral Hospital?”

  “He has.”

  Bingo. They had their connection. Jonah was grateful for that; he thought it might come in handy when he and Francesca met with the investigators later this morning. At least they’d have proof that a second murder victim had a link to someone at the salvage yard. Two links were better than one—and might help combat Finch and Hunsacker’s upset over what’d happened last night.

  “For a brief period, anyway,” Nate was saying. “Looks like he was committed three different times, all for short stints. In 2006, he was in for a psychotic episode. Spent one week at the hospital. In January 2007, he was committed again, for violent behavior against his sister. I guess he pulled a knife on her—”

  “He what?” Jonah broke in.

  “Don’t get too excited. It was only a butter knife, and the details were never clear as to whether he meant to harm her.”

  “How long did he stay that time?”

  “Two weeks. Then his psychiatrist released him into the custody of his parents. He went back a month later for depression.”

  “So…he’s what? Bipolar?”

  “He has schizoaffective disorder with severe bipolar tendencies.”

  “That’s a mouthful.”

  “Not a pleasant diagnosis.”

  “You mentioned a psychotic episode. He loses touch with reality?”

  “According to his doctor, a Dr. Shishimu, he sometimes hears voices that tell him to act a certain way.”

  “Do they tell him to murder women?”

  “Dr. Shishimu said
he’d be very surprised if Dean ever harmed anyone. The voices tell him what clothes to wear, what bus to take, even if that particular bus doesn’t go where he originally wanted to, what to eat and so on. You get the picture.”

  Unable to pace or do much of anything else in the bathroom’s confined space, Jonah sat on the edge of the tub. “What a way to live.”

  “That’s not all. A nurse at Laurel Oaks told me she remembered him having a persecution complex. When he was there last, he insisted there was someone out to kill him, and the voices were telling him he had to get home in order to protect his mother.”

  “He thought it was someone in the hospital?”

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  “Interesting.” The man Jonah had met didn’t seem that far gone. Apparently, his meds were working well enough to make him appear somewhat functional. “What medication do they have him on?”

  “Geodon.”

  “Never heard of it.” But then, he wasn’t very familiar with mental illness or its treatments.

  “Neither had I, so I searched the Internet for info. It’s considered one of the ‘newer generation’ anti-psychotics.”

  “Which means…”

  “I’m not sure exactly. It’s more recently developed, I guess. It inhibits the absorption of dopamine in the brain, but I think they all do that. Anyway, he’s also on Depakote, a mood stabilizer, to treat the bipolar.”

  “I see. Anything else?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Thanks, man. I appreciate the legwork.”

  “No problem. I’ll send you an e-mail with all the names and dates.”

  Jonah had just hit the end button when another call came in, this one from his ex-wife. Apparently, Lori was tired of sending him text messages without getting a response. Since even his mother’s involvement hadn’t brought results, she was breaking away from their usual mode of communication.

  “What’s it going to take to get some breathing room?” he muttered, then answered so he could finally get her off his back.