Ghosting
Calle J. Brookes
Copyright © 2015 Calle J. Brookes
Cover by CJ Brookes
All rights reserved.
Revised Edition
The Lost River Lit. Publishing, L.L.C. name, and imprint are the sole properties of independent publishers Calle J. Brookes and B.G. Lashbrooks. They cannot be reproduced or used in any manner; nor can any of their publications or designs be used without expressed written permission.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, or locations, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
To my grandmothers—two women who taught me to follow my dreams. You helped shape the woman I am. Thank you…
Other Titles by Calle J. Brookes
Paranormal
Dardanos, Co. Series
The Blood King
Awakening the Demon’s Queen
The Healer’s Heart
Once Wolf Bitten
Live or Die
The Seer’s Strength
The Warrior’s Woman
The Wolf’s Redemption
A Warrior’s Quest
The Wolf God & His Mate
Out of the Darkness
Warrior Blind
The Witch
Dardanos, Co: The Adrastos Series
The Outcast
The Forlorn
Romantic Suspense
PAVAD: FBI Series
Beginning
Waiting
Watching
Wanting
Second Chances
Hunting
Running
Redeeming
Revealing
Stalking
Ghosting
Thrillers & Suspense
PAVAD: FBI CASE FILES Series
#0001 Knocked Out
#0002 Knocked Down
Coming Soon
Balance of the Worlds
Ghosting
Calle J. Brookes
Lost River Lit Publishing, L.L.C.
Chapter 1
Strings. Life was strings. Almost like pushpins on a bulletin board with yarn connecting the dots. Everything was connected. Everything.
Kelly Reynolds had always thought of life that way. Thought of science that way. It had been one of the few ways she’d consoled herself as a child when her mother would turn violent. When she’d think of the loving father who’d supposedly been dead since she wasn’t yet a teenager. When she’d think of the two sisters she’d loved since the moments they were born.
Everything and everyone was connected. Working forensics for the best federal agency in the country was just another string that made up her life.
Josh was a string, too. A big one. That was why she found herself opening the door to the house where she knew she’d find him. It wasn’t where he lived—but he owned it, along with four other property foreclosures that he was in the middle of rehabbing in his spare time. She’d tried two other properties first—the main reason it was so late.
She had to be at work in seven hours. So did he.
The case he’d just finished had been one of those that everyone knew was a nightmare. One that would stay with you for years to come—if you ever escaped it.
And Josh had been the one to hold the twelve-year-old boy as the child had died. Held him, talked with him, and from what she’d been told by her father in confidence a few hours earlier, had tried to reassure the kid that life on the other side would be better than the one the boy was leaving behind. Because they’d all known the boy, the child of the perpetrator, would not live through the day. And he hadn’t.
Josh had been the one to step up and stay with the little boy who’d had no one.
She found him in what would one day be a dining room, yanking up the hardwood and ripping individual nails free with his hammer. His hair, longer than she would have ever expected from a Mr. Conservative like Josh, was uncombed and shaggy around his face. His glasses were missing—though he only used them for reading—and sweat trickled down his forehead. He’d yanked his shirt off and wore only a thin tank undershirt.
He definitely didn’t look all nerdy and intellectual without his shirt, muscles flexing as he yanked and ripped. She’d noticed that before whenever she caught him doing something so physical. He didn’t have a football player build, but he wasn’t rail skinny either. And he was strong, extremely so.
He’d worked his way through college and post-grad doing construction. As smart as he was—he had two doctorates compared to her one—and he’d still had to pay part of his way with manual labor after his mother’s death had screwed up his scholarships.
As she looked at him, she couldn’t help but think how it had definitely paid off. Josh was damned hot, and she wasn’t too blind to see that.
He was also one of her best friends, and she hated to see him hurting. “Josh?”
It took her a few tries, but he eventually looked at her. It was then that she realized some of what she’d thought was sweat on his cheeks wasn’t.
Something about seeing a strong man weeping had her gut clenching and her own eyes watering. He wiped the tears, sweat, and dust off his face with the waistband of his shirt, exposing a very well-defined set of abs. “Kelly Danielle, what the fuck are you doing down here this late? Are you trying to get mugged, or worse?”
“Hardly.” He was one of the only people on the planet who called her by her full name—something she usually snipped at him about. But not tonight. Definitely not tonight.
Josh rarely cursed. And never at a woman. Never at her. And she’d never seen him cry before. He’d always been so strong. She’d been the one to weep and break down in front of him dozens of times before. “Everyone was worried about you. And no one could get a hold of you. I took a chance on a hunch. Figured you were doing exactly what you’re doing. It just took a little time to find out the where.” And the where was a huge old house a mile from her own home. She should have tried there first.
“What I’m doing is trying to make this dump turn a profit. How did you get here?” He wiped his hands on a rag, then straightened. Kelly looked up at him. Josh was six-five or six and had more than half a foot on her. Long, tall, and beautiful. If someone was smart enough to take a close enough look.
“I took a magic carpet. Seriously? I took a cab, all three places.” She looked around the room. The hardwood was probably original, and there was a seriously old clock shoved against one wall. The walls were olive green. Ick. Sometimes she wondered about the properties he picked. But he seemed to have a knack for picking ones that made substantial profits.
“You didn’t have to. I just… needed some time to think.”
“I know what happened.”
“Do you? How can anyone?”
There was so much bitterness in his words. Something she wasn’t accustomed to hearing from him. Josh usually had an almost Zen attitude about the world. A sort of acceptance that there was evil out there, and that evil was balanced by hope. He was such an optimist it had driven her crazy the first few months she’d known him. Until she’d started to depend on it.
That attitude had been missing a lot lately.
And that worried her, just as much as it had worried the others who cared for him. Like her father. It was his concern that had made her go out looking for Josh. She didn’t like seeing the one parent who she actually loved and respected worried. Her father had enough on his
plate right now. He’d been so concerned for Josh.
And his concern had rubbed off on Kelly. “I just wanted to check on you, make sure you were as all right as you could be.”
“Hell no, I’m not.” He threw the hammer and it embedded in the plaster wall. Kelly jumped, fighting the instinctive urge to back away. She didn’t deal with such violent emotions very well. And she never had.
A curl of unease went through her stomach, but she ruthlessly pushed it away. She didn’t have to be afraid of this man, and she knew that. Deep down where it counted, she knew that. It was just the tenseness of the moment causing her anxiety. “Josh…”
He looked at her, from eyes that were so pain-filled she wanted to weep for him. “I held him. I held him on my lap for fourteen hours because he didn’t have anyone else. Not so much as a second-cousin. He wasn’t any older than Ry, Kel. And I kept seeing Ryan there. And I kept thinking why couldn’t that little boy have had someone there who loved him like we love Ryan. Why did he have to die knowing that the one person on the planet who should have protected him was the one who put him in that hospital bed to begin with? And why didn’t I see what was going on sooner?”
“It wasn’t your fault.” And it wasn’t. Her father had shared enough of the case specifics for her to know that. But Josh put so much pressure on himself sometimes. Superhero complex. Always trying to save the world. “You can’t protect everyone; we both know that. You did the best you could. And that little boy at least had you with him to help him not be quite as alone. That matters.”
Kelly did something she so rarely did, especially with a guy, she hugged him. She wrapped her arms around his waist, and she held on. It didn’t matter that he was covered in sweat and grime and heaven only knew what else, she just held him.
Chapter 2
He hadn’t always liked the woman hugging him. He’d first thought the purple-streaked redhead with the wild clothes and unprofessional body piercing collection was nothing more than an ungrateful witch who was going to make one of his closest friends’ lives more difficult than it needed to be.
She’d been rude and foul-tempered and selfish at first appearance. It had taken him a little while—a few weeks, maybe—to realize that wasn’t who she was on the inside at all. All her prickliness had been her way of protecting herself from the blow after blow life had been raining down on her back then. He knew her history, knew about the abuse she’d suffered as a child. And he’d been there front row when she’d been shot. He’d had her blood literally on his hands that night.
And less than two months later he’d carried her out of the office that had exploded around her. He’d sat with her in the hospital, gun ready to protect her no matter what. And their friendship had grown in the eighteen months she’d been in St. Louis. He didn’t want her to see him like this. Not Kelly, with her ridiculously soft heart. “You need to go.”
“Not until you stop for tonight. You’ve done enough. This place will still be here tomorrow, waiting for you. It’s probably been here for a thousand years already.”
Yeah. It would. Seems like all he had lately was some foreclosed buildings and a place on the periphery of his friends’ lives. Even his best friend J.T. was moving in a new direction—one directly involving Kelly’s younger sister, Emma. Things had already changed for them all. His friend was spending most of his free time with Emma, and not Josh like he was used to. Josh knew enough about the human mind to know that he wasn’t reacting well to the changes that had happened lately.
He was losing his focus, his determination, and—though he wasn’t brave enough to say it out loud—he was afraid he was starting to lose his ability to do his job with the Prevention & Analysis of Violent Acts Division of the FBI.
More. He wasn’t sure he wanted to anymore. Wasn’t certain there was even a point to it all anymore. Every time his team removed a killer, or arsonist, or rapist, or trafficker or whatever the hell else kind of monster they went up against, ten more rose up to replace them.
He was damned tired of feeling like the hamster on the wheel. Anymore it seemed like they were always just spinning. Pointless. “I’m not fit company tonight.”
“Are you ever?” She teased as she said it, flashing the smile he’d always thought was the most perfect one he’d ever seen. Not that anyone ever saw her smile that often. She was usually a serious type of person. Solemn. And sort of sad.
That always hurt him whenever he thought about it. Kelly had one of the softest hearts of anyone he knew; she didn’t deserve to be sad all the time. That had him sighing inside a bit—she was there because she was worried, wasn’t she? About him. And that had had her taking a cab all over the city—which probably hadn’t been cheap, either. “Maybe not. But tonight’s worse than usual.”
“I heard. There wasn’t anything more you could do.”
“I did the best I could. Rationally, I know that. But emotionally? A twelve-year-old boy shouldn’t die of radiation poisoning knowing his own father was the one who killed him. That kid knew, Kel. He knew. I don’t understand parents who can do that bullshit to their children.”
She stepped back from him and turned her head to stare out the window. Josh silently cursed what he’d said.
“There’s something broken in a parent like that, I think. There certainly was in my mother.” She rubbed her arm like she always did whenever she spoke about the woman Josh knew had hurt her. “I always knew she hated me—us, really—and I always knew my father loved us. I don’t remember the first time she hurt me, but I remember how much she terrified me. Kids aren’t stupid. I’m sorry for that little boy, Josh. Sorry he didn’t have a good life—but I am glad he had someone like you to be with him there at the end.”
She surprised him when she turned back to him and hugged him again. It was the longest she’d ever touched him. He resisted the urge to just cling. “Yeah. I’ll never forget him, that’s for sure. I’ve never seen a braver kid. Come on. I’ll drive you home.”
As he said it, his phone started ringing, the particular ringtone that signaled it was his boss Hellbrook and that it was an urgent call.
When it was that sound, everything had to stop until he checked in.
“A case.” She stepped away from him quickly. “I’ll call a cab.”
“Hell no. There’s no way I’m putting you in a cab this late at night, by yourself.”
“I’m hardly helpless female material. And I’m close enough to walk.”
“Humor me. This way your dad won’t kill me.”
Josh grabbed his bag and locked the door. She didn’t say anything, just followed him quietly out into the drive where his off-duty vehicle waited. He’d had the old truck since his college days. She hated the truck, but she didn’t say anything this time.
He appreciated it. Somehow, just having her there helped a little. He wasn’t ready for that to end just yet. She climbed in the cab of his truck and said nothing. Kelly rarely said much, especially in times of stress.
They were halfway to her house when her own phone rang. She answered quickly and listened for a few moments, then ended with…”I’m not exactly happy about it, but I’ll be there soon. Yeah, I’m with Josh now. He was called in, too.”
***
The PAVAD building was different during later hours than it was during Kelly’s normal nine-to-five. Hollow, quiet, subdued. Kind of sad.
It almost gave Kelly the creeps, even though she loved working with the division.
She hadn’t spent much time on the upper floors, even the third, where Josh’s unit was located. Her father, the team coordinator for the entire Complex Crimes Unit, waited for the two of them there.
Along with the director of the entire PAVAD division Ed Dennis, and Josh’s direct supervisor, founder of the Complex Crimes Unit, Michael Hellbrook.
Big guns, for sure. Somehow she suspected she so wasn’t going to like what was about to happen.
“Dad?” It was easier to focus on her father. The other two men in
timidated her though she would never admit it. People in authority freaked her out and probably always would. Her mother had trained them early to avoid all law enforcement, if possible. “What’s going on?”
“A consult in Tennessee. Sorry we had to call you out this late. But you’re the top of the list of available for forensics.” Her dad patted her shoulder and left his arm there.
She didn’t pull away. Not like she would have even a year earlier. It had taken her a while to be comfortable with her father’s habit of casually touching the people he cared about.
Her father touched the ones he loved, and it had taken her a while to figure out that it was his way of ensuring they were really there. That they weren’t going to just disappear on him somehow. And the connection was something her father had apparently needed. Josh had pointed that out, but it had taken Kelly a while to understand it. “What do you need?”
It was Hellbrook who answered. “An old friend of mine has asked us for a favor. And you and Compton are the answer.”
“What have we got?” Josh asked. He held out a hand, right next to where Kelly stood. Her father placed a file in his palm.
“Skeletal remains found in Tennessee. At this point, we’re not sure it’s a PAVAD jurisdictional case. Or even if it’s a murder. That’s where you’re needed, Josh. Victimology can go either way,” Hellbrook said. “Dr. Reynolds, this crime scene may come down to forensics only. And we need someone with experience to evaluate. And you drew the short straw. It’s rather degraded. That’s where you’ll come in. This will be a forty-eight-hour assignment, at most. Get in, get out. Make the call whether a CCU team will come in behind you.”
Ghosting (PAVAD: FBI Romantic Suspense Book 10) Page 1