“I didn’t believe you until the crime scene came over the wire,” said Cole, “same MO, dragged body.” Both men flinched at the same time. “Anyway, see Detective Lundy. I don’t have to remind you what happens if you get caught—”
“I’m not going to get caught,” Dante shook his head.
“You understand the government cannot bail you out. Don’t let your emotions of what the sociopath did to your sister rule your actions,” Cole said.
The government denied all knowledge, or they’d known it better as plausible deniability. Unless an agent was backed by a team like Dante’s, the Undesirables, he was screwed. Dante ground his back molars together to keep the image of his dead, tortured sister out of his mind.
“I sent over the credentials you’ll need to access the area and gather your information,” said Cole.
“Much appreciated,” Dante saluted his partner and disconnected the live-feed from his phone.
“Your final destination is on your right.”
“Always a pleasure, Nadine,” Dante answered the robotic feminine GPS voice coming from his dashboard of his borrowed black SUV. Up ahead, to his right a large group of people—cops, reporters and on-lookers—milled around. A quick glance in the rearview mirror gave him the go to make a huge u-turn and park on the other side of the street, facing north so he could have a quick get away to his car if necessary. These situations were never smooth for an agent.
Dante reached for his sunglasses from the visor and stepped out of the vehicle. The early Sunday morning sun showed promise of a powerfully hot day. Keeping his glasses on kept others thwarted from the awkwardness of trying to read his eyes. The mirrored shades hung against his ears and slid comfortably against the bridge of his nose. Up ahead the crowd parted. The scene on the two way street had become a local event. Crowds of people stood on the sidelines as police officers put up yellow tape to block off the scene. A few reporters stood with notepads in hands and several onlookers used their phones as cameras to document everything. The crime scene came equipped with a tamale stand and a coffee stand. Spiced meats, cooked fruit, and coffee filtered the morning air. A young barista with a low cut shirt and perky breasts smiled sweetly and nodded her head toward her goodies, an array of different coffees.
Coffee sounded good right about now. Last night whipped through him like a hazy blur. The piping hot black liquid would be good to jolt his system. The barista batted her eyelashes and licked her lips, offering more than just coffee as she handed him a cup and a slip of paper, no doubt her phone number.
Dante purposely reached for it with his left hand and pointed toward the ring with his right. “Sorry, married.” He said with a wink and she smiled, snapping her fingers.
Why in hell was he still wearing the ring? And why in hell would he use it to ward off women? Dante loved women. Lots of women. So many women, he often needed a vacation from his vacation with women.
Well, with the way the barista backed off when she saw it, it could be worth it to have some peace and quiet while he was in town. Typically he liked his missions like he liked his women, fast and easy. Something in his gut told him he was in a heap of trouble with his latest mission, considering the length he went through to track down Leonardo Marchette.
The bastard slipped through his fingers before and he’d be damned if he’d let it happen again. He’d been chasing him unofficially since he was seventeen when Leonardo murdered his sister. Dante made the sign of the cross as he thought of his beloved Allegra. Every test he took to qualify him for Special Ops, Special Forces, and Black Ops covered his relationship with his family. No one wanted a loose-cannon and for twenty years Dante managed to keep his emotions under control. But now with him so close to catching Leonardo, Dante tried to contain his vengeful excitement.
Officially, Dante spent his career as an agent trying to locate him. It had been one thing or another and this time he wasn’t going to stop. Leonardo was somewhere in Florida, more importantly he was somewhere in the Tallahassee vicinity. Dante’s skin pricked knowing he was this close.
His eyes focused on the makeshift privacy screen held up by four white sheets. A man in a white overcoat, plastic-bootie slippers and blue rubber gloves pushed his way through the opening of the curtain. The coroner was here. Now maybe some work could get done since no one was allowed to touch the body until he arrived. A collective gasp from the crowd reached the clouds at the limited peek of the massacre behind the sheets. Maybe he was too hardened by the lengths criminals went to, to make their name in the world. Nothing shocked him. The same couldn’t be said for the extras walking by him fighting their gag reflexes. Today’s crime sight would be no surprise to him, except for one thing. There, in the midst of the uniformed officers, standing behind a wide lens camera stood Harley Tomasello.
His bride.
What the fuck was he thinking? What the fuck was she even doing here? She left him this morning wearing a pair of jeans and a light colored shirt. Now she wore a pair of skin-tight black jeans that showed off her fantastic ass and a tight black shirt, armored vest. He wasn’t sure which was more attractive, the bullet-proof vest or the gun and holster and hardware strapped to her thigh—a standard police officer issued nine mm. He liked a girl who knew her way around a weapon.
What he didn’t like was the way this asshole pushed her shoulder forward so he could follow the coroner in the hut. Dante kept his eyes focused on the dude. He wore a Sears suit, nothing special about the square shoulders and bland clothing, and kept his hands on his face. The morning sun wasn’t fully up yet but Dante was willing to bet his right nut this redneck was the leading officer on the scene. What was the name his supervisor Cole gave him? Steve Lundy. Yea, that was it. Dante sighed heavily and forged forward. This wasn’t going to be fun.
“Detective Lundy?” Dante said walking under the yellow police tape securing the crime scene.
The man named Lundy spun around, beady blue eyes looked up at him. “No sir, you need to go back behind the lines.”
“You spoke with my boss, Cole Wentworth. I’m Special Agent Rossi.”
“Damn,” said Lundy, pinching a wad of chewing tobacco between his bottom lip and teeth, “You boys move fast. What’d you do, fly here?”
Wheels were up the minute the picture bleeped across the screen of his phone, but this guy didn’t need to know that. “The sooner we catch this guy, the sooner I will be out of your hair.”
Lundy made a hissing noise with the back of his teeth then spit out a brown liquid into a coffee cup. “I already patrolled the area, I think it was an accident. These people don’t pay attention, too quick to try and jump on the back of a truck for day laboring.”
These people, Lundy referred to were the lines of Mexicans standing on the side, crying, praying, and twisting their rosaries around their wrists. The south didn’t seem much different than the neighborhoods in New York City. There were the Jewish neighborhoods, Puerto Rican, Dominican and, of course, the Italian. The difference there and here was the fact that up north there was more tolerance. He thought about his new wife.
With Tomasello as a last name, he bet Italian blood coursed through her veins. Chet didn’t give him the rundown of too much other than warning him of Harley’s wrath if pissed off. Really all Dante needed was for his cousin, Chet, to point out which one was Harley. His practical jokester cousin probably thought it funny as hell to omit Harley worked for the police department.
“Allow me to be the judge.”
“Well, there ain’t much here for you to see. Hard to get some identification, ain’t much of his hands left.”
All the more reason Dante suspected Leonardo’s handiwork. Leonardo slept comfortably to the shrill of a scream from a good old-fashioned dragging. It never mattered the distance of a drive. He drove with a person handcuffed to the door until the screams stopped. The whole road ahead needed to be sealed off and hosed down with an industrial strength chemical spray if Dante’s hunch was right.
“Have you thought about getting the road blocked further down?”
Lundy craned his neck down the road and shook his head. “Don’t see any reason to. Look,” Lundy elbowed Dante in the ribs as if they were old friends. “The way I see it, this kid got hooked to an early morning hunter. We hunt in these parts.”
No mistake on the, ‘these parts’. Dante raised an eyebrow. So far two different stories of what may have happened to the body.
“You’re not from around here,” Lundy used his great detective skills.
He could have told him he’d been to Tallahassee so many times he ought to be a tour guide, but right now this redneck needed to know the minimum. Dante bit his tongue to keep from speaking his mind. “No. Mind if I see the body?”
“Be my guest.” Lundy nodded his head toward the lining of the tent and slipped inside before Dante could move, more than likely to prepare everyone in there for the higher-ups who were taking over. He’d heard the speech before and so he gave it a few seconds before entering the space. Lundy’s back was to Dante’s. He fully expected the man to be rolling his eyes right about now. The red headed coroner’s eyes averted from Lundy’s to his, nervously chuckled, and his freckled covered face reddened. Harley stood directly in front of Lundy clicking away with her camera and her back to Lundy.
Getting hitched last night was fun and it was business, but right now he needed to be serious. He didn’t need the distractions of her fawning over him at a crime scene. He needed her to understand this was his business. It would be best for her as well. This jerk of a supervisor she had wouldn’t appreciate her being involved with him and when he left, Lundy could make her life miserable.
“Harley, I would like to introduce you to Special Agent,” Lundy half turned to make the introduction which was just a simple wave in Dante’s direction, “Rossi.”
As Lundy’s body turned, Dante watched Harley click away, dismissing Lundy and focusing on the blood stained body.
“Hi,” Harley said dismissively, still looking away. She’d tossed her dangling badge over her back to keep from getting in the way of her photographs.
“Tomasello, I’m about to go check out across the street.”
The shutter clicked away on her camera as she grunted an audible sound.
“Tomasello?” Lundy said impatiently.
Dante watched with amusement when Harley snapped her head up, eyes darkened with irritation at Lundy. Maybe she hadn’t really caught a glimpse of him yet. He was waiting for her to glance over Lundy’s shoulder and see him. Why did he have a desperate need to want to see her smile again? She did that a lot in the wee hours of the morning. Each kiss he placed on her neck brought out a moan.
“What?” she growled.
“Harley,” Lundy cleared his throat impatiently, “we have a visitor on the crime scene today. I want you to be nice.”
Strange, he thought, the pit of his stomach flittered. Maybe the coffee had an effect on him? Dante shifted his feet in anticipation of their eye contact. He suddenly felt nervous and unsure of himself. Were his palms sweating?
When Harley looked at him, Dante noted she wore little makeup; a line of eyeliner over her top lid that thickened the look of her long dark lashes and a smear of tinted lip-gloss covered her full lips. A taste test of its flavor seemed good right now. But no, he had to remember to get it through Harley’s head before she said anything, to not acknowledge their meeting.
To his astonishment, Harley’s lashes fluttered up at him. She half smiled and said without any recognition, “Yeah, nice to meet you.”
****
Harley steadied the camera in her hands. Suddenly, the one thing she used like another limb chilled her fingers. Did her temperature spike or something? True, June in Florida meant temperatures spiked the ninety-degree mark by eight am, but at half past six she already felt the slow trickle of sweat drip down her back. She steadied her eyes on the man standing before him and gave a half smile.
She prayed Dante Rossi didn’t expose this stupid mistake of theirs. Her heart sank into the pit of her stomach and she hoped her eyes did not reflect the panic bubbling behind them. She didn’t need Steve Lundy picking up on her craziness or to blow this case.
Dressed in a pair of elbow length black rubber gloves and fitted with a headband magnifier, Robert, the coroner, cleared his throat. He rummaged through the pants pocket of the victim. “What a hell of a way to go?”
“Got a COD?” asked Dante.
COD? Special Agent? Who in the hell did she marry? Superman? He certainly did have the body of a superhero along with the alias style clothing. A suit and tie. Harley pressed her lips together to keep from licking them. Her fetish for a sharp dressed man bubbled. Steve interrupted her thoughts.
“Cause of death? The poor smo’ got hit and drug by a car.”
“And the driver didn’t stop?” asked Robert raising his red eyebrows, validating Dante’s suspicion.
“In the early hours of the morning?” Steve’s voice went up an octave, “In this neighborhood?”
If Steve was right and the kid was hit by a hunter, wouldn’t the hunter have been armed with weapons? A squishy sound filled the room. Robert’s fingers felt around the bloody skull. “Well looks like the driver was able to get off one shot. Right here,” he dug his fingers under the chin. Just the tip filled the small bullet hole.
“Damn it!” Steve punched his meaty hands together. “Now I gotta go look for a shell casing. Harley, put the few elective courses you took in high school to work and take pictures. Hell,” he pushed his way out of the tent barking out orders outside, “and hurry up, I need your bilingual ass to come interpret.”
Harley squatted down to change cameras, grabbing her Cannon Rebel nestled in its case, her fingers brushed against the cold steel of her back-up gun—her favorite Sig Sauer P220, Scorpion edition. A girl had to protect herself. Ignoring everyone else, Harley viewed the scene through her lens. The face had been so disfigured, dental works were going to be needed, if there were any. People from this side of town didn’t worry as much about dental hygiene as they did day laboring. Could their John Doe have been getting an early start on day laboring? The ratted strips of shirt gave little information, but Harley recognized the crimson and gold colors of the shirt. This kid went to or supported someone from the same school as Hannah. She still wasn’t sure of the need for Dante Rossi’s presence but she still had a job to do. Dante, squatting down also apparently had a job to do.
Robert broke the silence. “Let’s just pray this was a mercy killing for this kid.”
“You can tell the age?” Dante said with a nod, clearly impressed.
Shaking his head Robert looked up and held the kids’ wrist. “I can tell that he’s under twenty-one. This is a tag for a rave all the local graduates have been coming into the hospital with all week. This colored wrist band is the only thing connecting all the kids who claim they were at different parties. It’s party central around here. Someone is making a killing off these kids, no pun intended.”
Since the graduation ceremony and bombshell, Harley hadn’t seen her niece. Hannah had all accesses to Harley’s townhouse whenever she wanted, and with her folks gone she would be staying at her place. Harley’s current job had her in and out with little time to check on the second bedroom upstairs designated for Hannah. Last night she hadn’t even bothered checking in at curfew time. Could Hannah be a part of this crowd? It was on the tip of Harley’s tongue, but Robert calmed her nerves.
“Alcohol poisoning, drug overdoses, a lot of confused kids and no, I didn’t see Hannah come through.”
“Hannah, as in your niece?” asked Dante.
Harley’s eyes stretched wide open, praying he would shut the fuck up. Robert’s green eyes cut between the two of them and the medical examiner did not miss a beat. Harley spent a lot of time with him at the morgue taking photographs for him. They’d gone out for drinks at Chet’s Place.
“You two know each other?”
; “We met last night,” Dante boldly answered.
The side of Robert’s cheek indented, his lips pressed forward as he ran his tongue over his front teeth. “Seems like I missed a good party last night.”
“Chet invited you,” Harley teased her old friend.
“I don’t trust Chet to serve me.”
“Smart move,” Dante laughed. His mouth opened wide showing a row of perfectly straight teeth. Her eyes caught a glimpse of his incisors and she shivered with the memory of them sinking into her collarbone.
Harley cleared her throat. “Can we talk about the body?”
“Okay. A young male in his teens dragged to death before eventually being put out of his misery. The way his jeans are imbedded with his skin and some parts missing, I would suggest we open the yellow police tape a lot wider. No telling how far he was dragged. Where’s Lundy? I need to tell him to move the people back.”
The sun from outside streamed in with a flash as Robert disappeared, leaving Dante and Harley alone. She inhaled deeply and glanced at her new husband. “You’re in law enforcement?”
“I am. You too, eh?”
She brandished her camera. “I work for them.”
“But you’re strapped.” Dante’s head nodded toward her thigh. She cocked an eyebrow at him, impressed with her beer-goggle eyes.
“I have a permit,” she smiled, not wanting to give too much away. “Thanks for not saying anything in front of Steve. The last thing I need is for him to know I married you.”
“Most women scheme to get me to the altar.”
She understood why. The man, built like a Roman God and gifted in bed, seemed to be a great catch for some woman—just not Harley. “Too bad we’re getting it annulled. Otherwise you’d learn quickly that I am not like most women.”
Mr. and Mrs. Rossi Page 2