Kiss of Deceit

by Patricia A. Rasey

  Now, here he was again, desiring a woman who belonged to another. And he had no doubt that if he bedded LeAnne McVeigh, the good Prosecutor Baker would make him regret ever laying a hand on her. His life would probably become a living hell. But what else in the last three months had he to live for?

  Screw ethics.

  He moved his hand down her back and cupped the soft cheek of her derriere. A perfect fit. He felt the sudden apprehension in her kiss, but he used his skilled tongue to coax her, soothe any misgivings she might have.

  He left her mouth, his lips making a trek to her ear. Her breath came in short pants; her head tilted to the side. A soft moan escaped her lips.

  “We shouldn’t…” she whispered. “The caretaker…”

  “Can watch,” he said huskily before dipping his tongue into her ear.

  She trembled beneath his touch. “We can’t,” she said, though her fingers tangled in the hair at the base of his head, telling Snake a different story.

  “We can.” He nipped at her earlobe and the small silver hoop hanging there.

  “Chad.”

  “Screw him.”

  Her body tensed, causing him to sense her withdrawal.

  Removing his hand from her backside, he slipped it beneath the short skirt and silk panties, cupping her bare flesh. Her intake was sharp but she did not move from his embrace as her eyes met his.

  His fingers kneaded the soft skin. “Don’t,” she whispered.

  He knew when to back off and he was not far from it. Yet he could not resist the urge to push the boundaries. “You want me as much as I do you.” He glared at her. “Deny it.”

  She pushed at his chest. “You’re so full of yourself, Gallego.”

  He tightened his hold on the small of her back and held her firmly against his pulsing erection. “Deny it,” he ordered.

  When she did not, he moved his hand lower and dipped into the cleft of her thighs, feeling how close to the truth he was. Her eyes widened and her pulse beat heavily at the base of her throat. Snake grinned, then pulled his hand from her.

  “Deny it. You’re so wet—”

  “Damn you, Snake,” she spat, pushing herself from his embrace and stepping back a few steps.

  With her kiss-reddened lips and mussed hair, she looked like she had just stepped from the sack. Too bad it wasn’t his. The nearly painful ache in his groin told him just how much he regretted the sudden separation. There would be no soothing his ache today—maybe never.

  She smoothed back the hair slipping from her braid. “You’re such an egotist. You wouldn’t know how to seduce a woman if you tried.”

  “I don’t think I was doing such a bad job a minute ago.”

  “Shows how little you know.”

  His ire peaked. He raised one brow. “Care for me to prove that fact to you again?”

  “Go to hell.”

  “I’m already there, sweetheart.” When she turned to stomp off in the other direction, he asked, “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

  “I need someone to bring my car.”

  “I can give you a ride back.” At the incredulous look she gave him, he held his hands up in front of him. “No funny stuff.”

  She looked at him like he had grown two heads, then laughed. “You already broke that promise.”

  * * *

  He grinned sinfully. “I don’t think what just occurred would fall under the category of funny business. I don’t know about you, but the thought of screwing you heats my blood, not tickles my funny bone.”

  “Do you have to be so crude? Screwing?” Her gaze widened. “Is that what you’d call it?”

  “What would you call it, LeAnne?”

  He advanced on her until they were mere inches apart. His hot breath spanned her cheeks. She would be lying, if she said she did not desire this man. The juncture of her thighs still throbbed from his touch.

  “Making love?” he whispered.

  “It’s a more civilized way of putting it,” she said, shifting her stance.

  “There’s nothing civilized about what I’d like to do with you.

  Besides, making love means there is love involved. Am I right?”

  She might have laughed had he not been so serious. Instead, she remained silent.

  “You planning on falling in love with me, Detective?”

  “No,” she stated, hoping she was never that unwise.

  “Then it’s screwing.”

  He walked away from her, not giving her a second look. He stepped over his bike, sat on the seat, and turned the key, pushing the electric start. The bike rumbled to life before he glanced back at her. He indicated she take her seat.

  There was no way she was ever getting back on that bike with him. The next time the opportunity arose, she wasn’t so sure “resist” would be a part of her vocabulary.

  She pointed to the caretaker’s house. “No, thanks, I’ll use his phone,” she shouted over the motor.

  Snake shrugged, then turned the bike in the opposite direction. He turned back to look at her. “See you around.”

  “Yeah,” she said, then watched as he drove out of sight. Reaching under her skirt, she readjusted her panties, something she was not about to do in front of him, then headed toward the house.

  Pouring herself into her work, the only thing that would make her forget the last fifteen minutes of her life.

  Fifteen minutes that should have never happened.

  Christ! What had she been thinking?

  Besides, she had a murderer to catch, and could not afford to allow her libido to get in the way. LeAnne had a feeling Snake Gallego was something she better just steer clear from; someone she had best avoid. One taste of him and she feared she might be a junkie for life.

  Chapter 13

  LeAnne walked up the slight incline to the caretaker’s home, still miffed at the idea of allowing Gallego such liberties. Her rear was likely to be branded with the invisible print of his hand for days. She shook her head in disbelief. With the turn her life had taken as of late, Chad would likely sniff out Snake’s scent the moment she walked through the door, never mind any explanations she might have. And then, there would be hell to pay. He would rant and rave for days, if not call off the wedding entirely.

  Could she possibly blame him, though?

  He’d have every right not to want her as his wife. Damn, once again she acted the fool. Chad was the one positive thing in her life, and she seemed to do everything in her power to throw it away. Her heart sank at the thought of betraying him. What had he ever done to deserve her and her traitorous soul?

  Walking up the cement driveway, LeAnne noticed the back door to the caretaker’s house set slightly ajar. “Hello,” she called out. “Is anyone home?”

  No answer came. She stepped closer to the opening, peering cautiously into the interior of the house. The dark room emitted not much in the way of natural light, due to the closed blinds. LeAnne reached around the corner for a switch, and flicked it on.

  Nothing happened.

  “Hello?” she called out again. Still nothing.

  Scanning the interior, everything appeared normal and in its place, though a slight odor caught her attention and sent off warning bells in her head. LeAnne reached into her shoulder bag and withdrew her gun, releasing the safety. She stepped cautiously to the side of the door; gun up. With the toe of her canvas shoe, she nudged the door further open.

  “Is anyone home?”

  Finally, after moments of silence and no acknowledgment to her presence, she stepped into the doorway, her gun pointed directly in front of her. Her gaze did a quick sweep before she entered the premises. Behind the door, she spotted a prone male body lying face down on the floor and a broken lamp near his head.

  LeAnne cautiously stepped forward, her gun still pointed outward, then hunkered down to check the neck for a pulse. The body, a white male in his late fifties to early sixties, lay stiff and cold. Dammit, LeAnne thought as she did another quick surve
y of the room. What the hell was going on here?

  Dropping her gun arm, she knelt beside the body and lifted the head. An extension cord had been wrapped so tightly around the neck that it nearly disappeared in the folds of his flesh. The surrounding skin had turned purple from broken blood vessels.

  LeAnne’s gaze flitted to the broken table lamp laying on its side. The cord lay askew; no near outlets in sight. Just as she thought, a weapon of opportunity and not premeditation. This poor sap had been at the wrong place at the wrong time. God rest his soul.

  She placed her fingers on the opened lids and closed the blood-red eyes just as a crash sounded from somewhere in the house.

  Her heart pumped furiously in her chest.

  She jumped to her feet and backed against the wall next to the door leading into the rest of the house. She took a deep breath. Pointing the gun in front of her, she entered the other room and scanned the perimeter.

  Silence greeted her.

  LeAnne stepped carefully through the kitchen, mindful not to make a noise, but it was hard to hear anything beyond her own short pants for breath and the sound of her blood pounding in her ears.

  As she willed herself to remain calm, a spatting sound of liquid hitting a solid surface could be heard over the tick-tock of the clock hanging on the kitchen wall behind her.

  Splat!—Splat!

  A maddening rhythm like a Chinese water torture.

  Finally summoning the courage, LeAnne stepped around the door frame and into what must have been the office. A movement caught her eye.

  Her gasp filled the dead air.

  A black cat pounced from the corner of the desk. It darted past the broken glass and out the door. A pool of water slowly made its way to the edge of the desk, dripping to a puddle on the linoleum.

  Splat!—Splat!

  LeAnne slid down the wall to a crouching position as a nervous giggle erupted from her throat. The cat had knocked over the glass of water, where it rolled and landed with a crash to the floor.

  Just a damn black cat.

  Leaning her head back against the wall, she released her shaken breath and willed her heart to cease its heavy beating.

  The rush of adrenaline had been incredible.

  Standing on her unsteady legs, she replaced her semi-automatic in her purse, then reached for the phone on the desk. Careful not to disturb any prints that might already have been there, she punched the numbers of the speaker phone with the cap of a pen.

  * * *

  Moments later, the house swarmed with Defiance County Deputies. One, standing guard, kept a running tally on all who entered the premises. Yellow crime scene tape cordoned off the house and part of the yard. A few deputies scanned the grass as another measured and triangulated the body and room inside. The Defiance-elected coroner had already come and gone, recording the time of death as around two in the morning.

  The coroner’s men stood outside, waiting for their chance at the corpse. One had a cigarette hanging loosely from his mouth while he spoke casually to the other, as though they might be shooting the breeze over a beer anywhere but at a crime scene.

  As she reentered the premises, LeAnne shook her head at the absurd lack of concern for the dead. She had called Bob Reese with the news immediately after calling Sheriff Joseph Drake. Bob would likely pull into the drive at any moment. Even though they were out of their jurisdiction, she wanted his view of the case, thinking of the very real possibility this case linked theirs.

  The grave site gave her little in the way of evidence, but had not left them empty-handed. Aside from the few chips of paint and the roses in the vase, they now had an idea of the height of their perp and that he had been wearing jeans the night before. While kneeling before Jillian’s marker, not only leaving a toe of his shoe and a knee indentation, he had caught part of his pants, probably his knee, on the corner of the brass plate. The fibers would be sent to the BG lab to be analyzed.

  She measured the indentation from toe to knee and guessed the perp to be about six-feet, two-inches tall. If the same person who killed Jillian visited her grave last night, then it was a good indication this person murdered the caretaker as well. He had witnessed the man responsible for the handiwork on Jillian’s grave and, left alive, probably could have identified him. A ruthless killer could not afford such mistakes.

  The most disturbing thing found, however, was the fluid left in the vase. LeAnne collected a small sample in a glass vial marked and tagged as evidence. The odor strongly hinted that it was a bodily fluid—urine. It too would be sent to the lab for verification. This piece of evidence spoke of further contempt for the victim or of women in general, though not much to go on.

  “Look what I have here,” one of the Defiance County’s deputies said, drawing LeAnne’s attention. He lifted the caretaker’s leg, with a slipper still on its foot, to examine the toe; the other slipper had been found outdoors in the grassy area. The struggle began outside. “Scuff marks on the toe and grass stains. Looks like our man, or lady,” he added sheepishly; LeAnne knew he didn’t believe that theory any more than she, “dragged the caretaker in from outside. By the looks of it, the old guy put up one hell of a fight.”

  “He was no match, though, not for a younger man probably in his thirties. This poor man never had a chance.”

  “What do we have?” Bob Reese interrupted as he came through the door.

  He wore a short sleeve, collared shirt and khaki pants. LeAnne rarely saw him out of uniform, it being his day off. Beads of sweat dotted his brow and soaked his armpits. His collar lay unbuttoned. His hair lay windblown and curling about the ears.

  “The heat getting to you?” LeAnne asked, never seeing Bob quite so ruffled before.

  He shook his head, a smirk on his face. “Air-conditioner gave out. A half hour’s drive straight into the sun is no walk in the park without the benefits of modern technology.”

  “What a hell of a day for that to happen.” LeAnne chuckled. Then turning more serious, she gave her attention back to the corpse. “We have a new victim. And if my intuitions prove to be right—I think this man’s killer is the same one who murdered Jillian, if not Miranda Holliday.”

  LeAnne restated the facts of the case, then briefed Bob on all the evidence she had collected, filling him in with all the details: the fluid sample, paint chips, fibers.

  “In short—if this was our guy, our caretaker here, poor SOB, caught him red-handed, so to say. Saw his face.”

  Bob knelt down by the body, touched the fixed lividity. “Seems he died face down.”

  LeAnne gingerly lifted the thread-bare tee shirt on the victim’s back, pointing out the slight bruising on the lumbar region. “I’d say the caretaker caught our perp doing his artwork, saw him relieve himself in the vase, and confronted him. The perp gets angry, heated words are exchanged. The caretaker threatens to call the authorities.

  “Our man panics—knows he’s about to be exposed. He lets the old man get close to the house, then pounces on him. A struggle begins, the caretaker loses his slipper, then is dragged inside. Looking for something to do the damage, the perp yanks the cord from the wall, pushes the old man to the floor and anchors him there with his knee— hence the bruising on his lower spine. He wraps the cord around his neck and…that’s all folks. Lights out.”

  Bob grinned. “Pretty much the scenario I might have come up with. What do you make of the supposed urine in Jillian’s vase?”

  LeAnne shrugged. “Could be anything, really. My guess would be showing further contempt for Jillian—disrespect. Since I found no semen at the sight, I would say he did not visit her grave to relive the fantasy. This man wanted to leave a message. He had to have known, sooner or later, someone would pay their respects.”

  “It could have been disrespect for either Jillian or the person he expected to visit, possibly the husband.”

  “And if he found out about Marcus’s release, then he’d know he’d visit the grave and that we’re still searching for our man
. He’s cocky— knows he’s not giving us anything to go on. I say he’s controlling what evidence we find.”

  “You think he meant for you to find the fibers?”

  “Our man’s smart, knows what he’s leaving us. But is this case, I think that was a mistake. He rips the hole in his knee, but isn’t aware he left anything behind.”

  “If he left behind trace evidence at the grave, then was careless here, we can tie him to both places,” Bob said. “We can only hope to find those matching fibers. That clue could link the two here to Jillian’s murder. I mean, if the person who spray-painted Jillian’s marker didn’t kill her, then why worry about being seen? Why go to this length to keep the old guy’s mouth shut? If we connect this to the grave, we can connect this to the person who killed Jillian. The only difference between the way the old man died and Jillian’s death is the use of a garrote, the extension cord—with Jillian he used his hands. Why not simply use his hands?”

  “Either he doesn’t have the upper-body strength for the man— remember the women’s hands were secured to the bed post—or it’s just not personal. Harold, here, had simply gotten in the way,” LeAnne said. “But the women, now that was personal.”

  Bob and LeAnne stepped aside as the Defiance County detective and deputies finished gathering evidence, not wanting to get in their way.

  If Bob was correct and they found fibers to match those from Jillian’s marker, they would finally have the connecting factor. “Now if we could only match this to the Holliday murder.”

  “We’re working on that. The lab in BG said they would have some preliminaries ready tomorrow. Maybe something will come up.”

  The detective on the case grabbed a roll of wide adhesive tape and tore off a large section. Careful not to disturb evidence, he lightly patted the carpet around the victim to pick up any foreign material. Maybe a hair or fiber that seemed out of place, inconsistent with the rest of the house. By the caretaker’s feet, the detective stopped and studied a few whitish-blue strands of cloth.

  “Look here.” He pulled tweezers out of his kit and grasped two small pieces of what looked like frayed material. He held them up for LeAnne and Bob’s inspection. “Jackpot.”