Contents
Title Page
Copyright
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
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Mailing List Sign-up
Acknowledgments
CHICAGO BROKEN
DETECTIVE SHANNON ROURKE BOOK 2
STEWART MATTHEWS
Chicago Broken: Detective Shannon Rourke Book 2
By Stewart Matthews
Copyright © 2017 by Primrose Publishing, LLC
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing, 2017
Chicago Broken - Detective Shannon Rourke Book 2 is a work of fiction. All aspects of the story, including (but not limited to) incidents, dialogue, settings and characters are creations of the author’s imagination. Any similarities to any person, living or dead, or any event, past, present or future, is coincidental.
Edited by Perry Constantine
Cover by Shayne Rutherford - www.darkmoongraphics.com
Interior Design by Colleen Sheehan - www.wdrbookdesign.com
CHAPTER 1
What a world.
All these women around. Their color-treated hair. Their leggings and skin-choking jeans. Their designer purses and matching half-shin boots. All this wealth and energy and planning put into each woman’s outfit—outfits which looked practically identical to the others—and not one of them had the wherewithal to do anything worth the pumpkin spice lattes they sucked down every morning.
Jennica Ausdall put her trust where it was earned. She didn’t trust her ex, she didn’t trust her son, and she sure as hell didn’t trust her brother-in-law.
She trusted herself. At least when it came to putting in the work for a respectable fall semester pep rally.
Oh, but the other football moms.
Yet again, she gave them a chance at redemption, and yet again, she stood before a gaggle of coffee-breathed housewives at the half-court line in Northern Cardinal Preparatory Academy’s gym.
They stared at Jennica like she was the stupid one. Like she forgot to pick up the pep rally banner from the printers.
But, no, that was Dakota Van Etten’s mistake.
“I am so sorry, Jennica. I thought the printers said they wouldn’t have it ready until the thirteenth.” Dakota’s little blond bun quivered with every word.
“Today is the thirteenth,” Jennica said. “Or did you not bother calling the printers this morning?”
“I haven’t yet, but—”
“Of course you didn’t. And that’s why I have to go do everything myself.”
Jennica turned on her heel and walked toward the doors leading outside. She’d had enough of these women. They were beyond useless. It was a miracle half of them hadn’t electrocuted themselves in curling iron accidents.
Outside the gym, it was a chilly late September morning. The wind brushed its fingernails across her bare ankles. A pair of boots would’ve been a smart choice, but after the fight she had with Leigh last night, wearing her strappy black pumps was the only choice.
She’d just have to think warm thoughts. Lucky for her, Dakota’s screw-up had her heated.
“Jennica, I said I’m sorry.” Dakota’s ratty little UGG boots shuffled behind.
“It’s fine,” Jennica said. “That’s what I get for delegating. I knew the banner was important enough for me to pick it up personally, but I took the lazy route and handed it off.”
“Please let me go get it.”
“So you can screw it up again?”
“But you’ve got so much to take care of here—you have to organize the pre-homecoming bake sale, give a presentation to the student council, and what about the hoodies for the spirit section at the games?”
“I don’t want hoodies.” Jennica would’ve spat if it weren’t beneath her. “We aren’t some inner-city school where half the kids are on free lunch.”
Jennica marched off the sidewalk. She didn’t break stride, even as her heels aerated the dewy grass in front of the Samuel T. Wendt memorial garden.
“But the kids all want hoodies,” Dakota said.
“The kids want to protest for legal weed and dance to music about rappers cheating on their wives,” Jennica said. “The kids don’t get everything they want. No one gets everything they want.”
Jennica looked at Dakota across the bridge of her nose. The woman was so tied up in getting the kids hoodies, she was as low into the ground as Samuel.
“The apparel the students wear to school functions is a statement about our values,” Jennica said. “If the students want to wear hoodies outside of campus, that’s fine. But I won’t have them looking shabby when they’re attending the pep rally I’ve worked my fingers to the bone to put on.”
Something snapped under Jennica’s foot. It sounded like a twig, but when she felt herself tilting to one side, nearly rolling her ankle, she knew it was no twig.
“Oh no, honey,” Dakota said. “They were so cute.”
The heel of her six-hundred-dollar shoe had broken.
Of course. Why wouldn’t it break right now? What other moment would be more perfect than this? She clenched her teeth and screamed out of frustration.
She plopped down in the grass and ripped the bad shoe off her foot.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Samuel smirking at her from the bronze placard.
She screamed and threw the broken shoe at his smug face. It missed. She took her other shoe off and tried to hit him again. It tumbled into an azalea bush.
“Do you want to borrow a pair of mine?” Dakota said. “I have some sneakers in the Explorer.”
Jennica scoffed. “I’d rather wrap my feet in burlap.”
Like hell she was going to be caught in Dakota Van Etten’s hand-me-downs.
She pushed herself up from the ground. Her SUV was on the far side of the parking lot—a long way to walk barefoot, but she’d bear it to keep her pride intact.
“At least let me go pick up the banner,” Dakota said. Her voice sounded more distant. At least she’d stopped following Jennica. “So you can run home.”
“If you actually want to help me, go back to the gym and try not to screw anything up—or at least wait until I can come back and fix whatever goes wrong next.”
Somewhere across the parking lot, she heard some brat rev the engine on his car. She’d report that to campus police
on her way out. Knowing Officer Howe, he was sitting in his toll booth watching The Price is Right with his headphones on, and wouldn’t hear a gunshot aimed at his head.
Ugh. There wasn’t enough time to do that. It was already past nine, and she had to get to the printers’ and be back on campus by 10:30 to prep for the student council presentation at noon.
Maybe she could flag down Dakota. If nothing else, she wanted to get back in Jennica’s good graces, so she’d go tell Officer Howe in a heartbeat. How could she possibly screw that up?
“Dakota?” Jennica turned around. A hundred feet off, the gym door swung shut. Of course. The one time Dakota did anything in a timely fashion, and Jennica could’ve benefited from her dawdling.
Fine. She’d tell Officer Howe herself.
Her SUV was up ahead. She stepped out from between two parked cars and planted her foot in a puddle that almost made her toes snap off from the cold.
She groaned. It would’ve been nice to say today couldn’t get any worse, but she knew this was only the beginning.
The engine revved again. It was closer. Maybe a couple aisles over, though God only knew why. The exit to the street was in the opposite direction. Maybe it was the parent of a new student, and they couldn’t find the way to the main entrance.
She was already buried under today’s schedule—so what did it matter if she took a minute to inform the new parent that not only did they have no business being in the student lot, but that they needed to do a better job familiarizing themselves with campus, because the school’s main entrance was on the other side of the building?
Jennica listened to the deep thrum of the motor as it moved the car further from her. She couldn’t quite see over the parked cars without her heels on, and missing one of her contacts didn’t help either.
Then, the car appeared at the end of the aisle. Jennica waved her arms, trying to draw it over.
It worked too well.
The engine howled and the car stuttered into gear—or at least it tried to. It stalled out, restarted, then came toward her.
It came toward her fast. Too fast.
What in the hell was wrong with this person? Who sped down the middle of a school parking lot? Did they have no regard for the possibility that children might come darting through the parked cars at any moment?
Jennica stepped into the middle of aisle—directly in the path of the speeding car. She put her hands on her hips.
The engine howled at her. She wasn’t going to back down. There was no meekness inside her. It could be a hundred of those things screaming toward her, and they’d all cow to her.
“Stop!” She held her hand out. She was a hundred feet tall, and the car’s engine was no more intimidating than a gnat’s buzzing.
She knew this car.
It was a dark blob when it turned down the aisle.
“Leigh, I said stop!” she screamed.
He didn’t.
Jennica tried to jump out of the way—breaking her favorite pair of black pumps was almost a blessing now. But, at the age of 46, even as hard as she worked to keep her body tighter than a clock spring, she was slower than she used to be.
She’d gotten herself mostly out of the way, but the car slammed her right thigh as it pounced at her. Her body spun through the air. She felt nothing but her leg, heard nothing but the whoosh of air through her ears, and saw nothing but a smear of reality as she spun then smacked her head on the asphalt.
Around her, the world turned to mush. The ground looked bleary. The chirping of morning birds and the squealing of the car’s tire as it ran from her both sounded like they had soft edges, as if she had cotton in her ears.
Then things came into focus. And right after the world sharpened, so did the pain in her leg.
She lifted her head up, stole at glance at her right leg, and immediately wished she hadn’t.
Jennica saw the bottom of her own right foot. She couldn’t see exactly where the break had been, but through all its panic and pain, her mind filled in the blanks for her right away.
Tires squealed. The engine hitched, then stopped. The car had stalled.
This had to be some kind of nightmare. She and Leigh had an argument last night, sure, but was it so bad that she deserved this?
Jennica lifted her eyes and planted her hands on the ground. She’d drag herself over to Officer Howe’s guardhouse, and when she got there, she’d strangle him with his own headphones. The idiot should’ve been over here as soon as it happened.
Behind her, the engine of Leigh’s car started again. It made a guttural noise, like a fat opera singer clearing his throat before starting an aria.
Her heart punched the back side of her ribcage over and over.
There was no time to get to the guardhouse. She had to get out of the open. Her only chance was to duck under one of the other cars.
Jennica’s hand reached out ahead of her. Her fingers grasped at the craggy asphalt, trying to gain some kind of hold on it. She pulled herself forward a few inches. Then her other arm reached out and dragged her body forward like she was freestyle-swimming across the parking lot. She kicked with her good leg and propelled herself a few inches more.
The sound of the engine was almost on her.
A half-dozen more reaches and kicks, and she’d be safely cuddled against the tread on the rear tire of someone’s Acura.
But it didn’t matter.
The tire of Leigh’s car met her first.
CHAPTER 2
What kind of CPD Detective wrote letters to a criminal they’d arrested?
Detective Shannon Rourke had never written a letter. If she wanted to talk to someone, she’d pick up a phone. If she didn’t want to talk to someone, she’d clack out an email.
But here she was, hunched over her desk at the District 12 Station, her brown hair fallen in front of her face, scrawling word after word on a yellow legal pad with one of those dollar-a-pack CPD-branded pens—the kind that always slipped through her sweaty fingers while she tried to write.
She felt like a sixth-grader doing English homework.
No, what she felt didn’t matter. Isabella Arroz was a human being, a woman who needed Shannon’s help. And from one erstwhile mother to another, Shannon swore she’d help.
But helping her meant trying to break the wall between them. It meant Shannon had to bring their relationship closer by earning her trust, by showing her that she actually cared about what Isabella had been through.
Glimmers of trust had already begun to show through the cracks. When Shannon made her last weekly visit, Isabella had come out to the visitors’ area for the first time. Shannon had gotten so used to being dismissed before catching a glimpse of Isabella, she almost didn’t know what to do when Isabella showed up.
Sure, Isabella had immediately turned around and gave Shannon the finger, but seeing her was something new, at least.
Baby steps.
Maybe next time Isabella would actually talk to her. She expected something like “go away,” or Shannon might get lucky and hear something more verbose like, “I don’t want to talk to you.”
Oh, that’d be real sweet.
Three months since Isabella’s arrest, and Shannon considered herself lucky to get seven words out of her.
What the hell kind of progress was that?
She swiped the legal pad off her desk, pulled open one of the desk’s aluminum drawers, and tossed the pad inside. The drawer slid shut with a hollow clang.
“Easy on the equipment, detective.” Sergeant Boyd swayed down the aisle between the other detectives’ desks. He was a large man—over six feet tall with enough girth to have to buy two plane tickets, but with the kind of muscle on his bones that stopped any flight attendant or ticket taker from arguing with him too much about buying a second ticket. “That’s government property, and last I heard, Uncle Sam ain’t exactly the richest guy in town no more.”
He had a familiar look on his clean-shaven face. A glint of schadenfreude in
his eyes. He plopped a fresh manila folder on her desk.
“What’s that?” Shannon said.
“Work.”
She sighed and sank back in her chair. “Why bother?”
“Detective Rourke, I can’t help but feel that you have an aversion to doing the job to which the city of Chicago has seen fit to bestow upon you.” Boyd tapped the folder with his heavy finger. “But the piece of paper in this folder could be your salvation.”
Shannon stared at it. “Doubt it.”
“In some ways,” Boyd said, “it feels like you expect the good people of Chicago to cut you a paycheck from their hard-earned wages so you can sit around and mope about arresting a woman who was clearly guilty of several crimes. Crimes she readily confessed to in front of a judge, if I recall. One of which was discharging a firearm at a CPD detective with the intent to kill her.”
“She didn’t hit me.”
“Then why were you put on one month’s leave, Shannon?”
Shannon popped her right shoulder. Most of the splinters were out, or supposedly inert. The surgeons, the doctors, the pharmacists, and the physical therapist swore to that. Still, Boyd’s question was like an incantation which made some hidden pain flare up.
“Have you ever seen that much money float down a river?” she said. “I needed time to grieve.”
“My mother always said the best way to get through your emotional pain was to stay busy. I think you’ve got a good bit of work ahead of you here.” Boyd slid the folder toward her.
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