If You See Her

by Shiloh Walker

  His arm wasn’t the worst part, though.

  It was his face, his battered, bruised face. That familiar face …

  “Oh, God,” she whispered, lifting a hand to her mouth.

  Law.

  She started to scramble out of the bed, but the cuff at her ankle stopped her. Swearing, she just stared at him. “Law,” she whispered.

  He gave her a shaky smile and made his way over to her bed, collapsing on it. “Hey, sweetie,” he said, out of breath.

  She reached for him and as his uninjured left arm came around her, she started to sob. Shit. She’d been so scared. So scared.

  The sobs came harder and harder, until they almost choked her.

  “Shhh …” He cradled the back of her head and murmured to her, his voice soft and low. “It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s all going to be okay.”

  She didn’t entirely believe that, but at least now she could believe that he was okay.

  For now, for her, that was enough.

  “Are you sure?”

  Dotti Coltrane peered up at him over the half lenses of her glasses, a mildly irritated look in her eyes. “Handsome, would I have called you if I wasn’t sure?” She sighed—a patented sigh that clearly said, I’m surrounded by idiots, and then she pushed the lab work toward him.

  Tapping it with a fingernail painted an unreal shade of neon green, she said, “Type AB. That’s Hope Carson’s blood. That’s the majority of what we found in the blood samples. But not all. There was also Type O. That wasn’t all that easy to find, and it’s not like we’re the FBI or anything. If it wasn’t for how weird this mess was, I don’t know that we would have even looked. Everything seems pretty clear-cut—she slits her wrists, falls down, hits her head. Seems pretty normal that she’d get blood in her hair. But it wasn’t just blood we found.” She produced a slide. “There was body tissue. I just don’t see how she could have hit her head and managed to get somebody else’s body tissue matted in her hair, Remy. I’m not buying it. Not unless she somehow managed to hit herself in the back of the head with the same bat she used to beat on her friend with—just doesn’t add up.”

  Remy rubbed the back of his neck.

  No, he couldn’t buy it, either. “And I don’t need to ask you if you’re sure it’s not her body tissue?”

  She gave him a baleful look.

  “Okay.” Blowing out a breath, he crossed his arms over his chest and stared off into the distance, building possible scenarios, discarding them. “So the question is, what’s going on?”

  Dotti watched him over the rims of her glasses, owl-eyed, excitement in her gaze. “I think what we might have here is a setup, Remy. Really.”

  “Really.” He shot her a narrow look and studied the report again. Even as the lawyer in him started to swear and sulk and pace—figuratively—the knot in his gut was unraveling.

  This made more sense in his mind.

  This didn’t leave him feeling like he was trying to force a square, rough peg in a neat, round hole.

  This didn’t leave him feeling like he was about to go brutalize an innocent woman.

  She hadn’t done it.

  Inside his head, a hundred silent screams eased and he glanced at Dotti, gave her a smile. “Thanks, Dotti,” he murmured, plucking the report up. “Mine?”

  “Yep.” She pushed her glasses back up her nose and focused on the monitor in front of her. “You know, I like Reilly. He’s a weird guy—keeps to himself and all, but I like him. He seems to know people pretty well. He’s not going to go hooking up with a nutcase, Rem. He’s just not.”

  Remy didn’t respond.

  Whether Hope Carson had attacked Reilly or not, she still had some unusual blights on her past. It eased the ache in his heart to think that he wouldn’t have to build a case against her, and he had enough now to think that maybe he wouldn’t have to, but the ache wasn’t completely gone.

  Just looking at her made him think about things he had forgotten he wanted, but they weren’t things he needed to have in mind when he was looking at her.

  Blowing out a sigh, he tucked the file in his briefcase.

  He needed to talk to the sheriff.

  Get some paperwork done.

  And let Hope Carson know she was free to go.

  Maybe she’d decide to leave town.

  That would be best, he thought.

  For all around.

  Yeah.

  Leave town, Hope … just leave town.

  Even though the thought of never looking into those sad green eyes left him with a bad, bad ache in his heart.

  CHAPTER

  THREE

  THAT WOMAN DIDN’T BELONG HERE.

  He watched as she drove into town in a simple, utilitarian sedan. Even without the tag on the back, it had rental written all over it. Either that, or cop car.

  She wasn’t a cop, though. He could peg a cop from a mile away and she wasn’t a cop.

  The car was basic, navy blue and simple, the sort of car that said, forget you ever saw me. It didn’t suit the woman who climbed out from behind the steering wheel. She wasn’t basic and she wasn’t the sort of woman that people forgot.

  She was … rather lovely, he thought. Long and lean, her skin the color of coffee and cream, her hair cut shorter than he preferred, but it suited her. A little broad through her shoulders and hips, but like her hair, it suited her. She looked … strong. But still very, very female. Legs that went on forever, full, lush breasts, and what seemed to be a very delectable ass.

  He wondered what her name was, what brought her here.

  She didn’t carry a purse, something he thought was kind of strange—most women did. There was an air of strength about her and that intrigued him. But as she started toward the police department, that air of strength wavered and he watched as she slowed to a stop, paused. Lifted her hands to her face. Those strong shoulders bowed, like she carried some awful burden. Then, less than fifteen seconds later, she lifted her head and squared her shoulders, stared at the building before her.

  Who are you? he wondered.

  He really, really wanted to know her name.

  Then she started to walk, slowly, and with purpose. One foot in front of the other.

  One foot in front of the other, Nia, she told herself.

  That was how a person handled the tough shit. By just getting through it—one step at a time.

  There was an empty, hollow feeling in the pit of her belly, and her eyes were strangely dry.

  She knew what they were going to tell her.

  She’d woken that morning in a nondescript, bland hotel room with the certain knowledge that her cousin was dead.

  Joely was dead.

  She’d been dead for close to two weeks, and although the sheriff hadn’t gone into detail, Nia knew Joely hadn’t gone easy.

  In a matter of minutes, Nia was going to know those details. Soon, Nia would see her cousin again and somehow, she knew it was going to leave a scar on her, on her heart, on her soul.

  Just keep walking, Nia. One foot after the other …

  She reached the doors a lot sooner than she wanted and went inside. A blast of cool air washed over her and she shivered, unreasonably cold. Logically, she knew it was hotter than hell outside—the weather in Kentucky could suck, something she had experienced before. Pushing up over ninety and the humidity was worse. But she was freezing. Cold. And now, she was freezing cold with sweat drying on her skin and the air-conditioning blasting down on her.

  One foot after the other … one foot.

  Up ahead, she saw a short, older woman with a helmet of gray hair, wickedly bright eyes.

  She caught sight of Nia and instinctively, Nia dodged into the nearest open door.

  As she came to a stop in the open doorway, she happened to notice the words Sheriff Dwight Nielson on the frosted glass door.

  My lucky day, she thought dismally.

  Nia swallowed around the knot in her throat and said, “Sheriff Nielson?”

&nb
sp; Shock could be a lovely thing, Nia thought, somewhat disconnected.

  She closed her eyes and the tears burning there slid free and rolled down her cheeks. She didn’t want to be here, standing by Joely’s side, staring down at what had been done to her.

  Beaten—so badly beaten, Nia couldn’t even recognize her.

  Her hair, that pretty, reddish-brown hair, was all wrong—cut too short. Why did you cut it, baby? Nia wondered, inanely, reaching up to touch Joely’s hair with a shaking hand.

  So wrong. All of this was wrong. Joely’s battered face, the short hair.

  Nia barely recognized her.

  Swallowing, she looked up and whispered, “I think it’s her. But … can …” She paused and took a deep breath. “I need to see her shoulder. The back of her right one.”

  The sheriff and the medical examiner shared a look and then together, they rolled the body over.

  The sight of that brightly colored tattoo against Joely’s pale flesh—it hit Nia like a dagger, straight in her heart. She wanted to scream. Wanted to hit something—break something. She wanted to sob … knew she would shatter if she let herself.

  Breathing shallowly, she looked away.

  Joely. It was Joely … she might not be able to recognize that battered, bruised face, and the hair might not seem right. But she knew that butterfly tattoo.

  Nia had an identical one. Joely’s was on her right shoulder, Nia’s was on her left. They’d gotten them on spring break, their senior year in high school … and they’d been grounded for two weeks after, because they hadn’t gotten permission.

  With a shaking hand, she reached down and touched the butterfly.

  The feel of Joely’s cold flesh under her fingertips was a brutal, almost painful assault to her senses.

  Human flesh shouldn’t feel like that.

  Ever.

  Joely …

  She bit down on the inside of her cheek before the sob could break free, bit until she tasted blood.

  Then she turned and met the waiting gaze of the sheriff and coroner. “It’s my cousin. Jolene Hollister. Joely.”

  The sheriff reached up, resting a supporting hand on her shoulder. “I’m terribly sorry, Ms. Hollister.”

  Nia nodded. Pressing her lips together, she reached up, touched her neck absently. “She … ah, she wore a necklace. Always. Never took it off—it was her mom’s. A gold chain, with a heart on it?”

  “There wasn’t a necklace. Her engagement ring was still on. We have that locked away—we’ll get that taken care of before you leave.”

  “Okay.” Her voice came out in a thready whisper and she cleared her throat, tried to find some remnant of strength buried. Joely …

  Tears burned her eyes and she blinked them back, focusing on the wall until she knew she could speak without crying. The screams, they wanted, needed to break free, but she couldn’t give in to them—not yet. Not here.

  Just under the grief, there was a hot, fiery ball of rage. And there she found the strength she needed. She reached for it, wrapped herself around it.

  Rage—so much easier than grief, so much easier to handle, so much easier to control.

  “Who in the fuck did this to her?”

  “Must have been rough.”

  Nielson looked at him and Keith grimaced at the look in the sheriff’s eyes. “Rough?” Nielson echoed. “No. Telling a man his prize hunting dog was accidentally run over on the highway, that’s rough. This was past brutal.”

  They watched as Nia Hollister climbed into her rented car.

  “She barely cried,” Nielson said as she drove away. “Hardly even a tear.”

  Jennings blew out a breath. “Can’t decide if that’s good or bad. Hate it when they cry, but it’s not good for somebody to not cry either.”

  “Kept waiting for her to break. She never did.” Nielson rubbed his naked scalp and shook his head. “That had to be one of the hardest things I ever did.”

  Nielson would have been prepared to see it through if she broke down, would have done the best he could to help. But all he could do was watch as she pushed that anguish somewhere deep inside and let the anger take the lead. Not good. Sometimes anger could get a person through sheer hell, but there was something about that glint in her eyes that bothered him.

  She could cause trouble, he suspected. A lot of it.

  And he had enough trouble on his hands already, thanks.

  She was leaving, though. She had a cousin to bury and Nia Hollister would need every bit of strength just to get through that.

  She started the car without looking at him and he watched as she backed up, merged with the traffic moving around the small town square. A hard day for that woman. Very hard. And it wouldn’t get any easier any time soon, he knew.

  He had nothing he could tell her.

  No news.

  No clues.

  No suspects.

  And that was the first thing he needed to do for Nia Hollister—find justice for her cousin. “Come on, Jennings. We’ve got a case to solve.”

  They headed toward his office—there, the small team he had assembled waited for him. He wished he had the manpower for a real task force, but the county of Carrington didn’t often see murders. He could happily go the rest of his life without having anything like this happen again, truth be told.

  As he and Jennings walked into his office, the three deputies fell silent.

  “We’ll keep this as short as we can,” he said, glancing at each of them. Settling behind his desk, he reached into a file and pulled out a picture of Jolene Hollister, laid it flat on his desk.

  It was nearly seven o’clock and he was tired as hell. He wanted to be home, with a cold beer, a sandwich, and something other than a pretty dead girl on his mind.

  But the pretty dead girl was dominating his thoughts.

  Staring down at her face, he sighed and looked up, studied each of his men. None of them were really equipped to handle this. Hell, he wasn’t equipped to handle this. He’d had his share of homicides come his way, but nothing like this. He had dealt with drunk driving, hit-and-runs, jealous spouses, pissed-off employees, and shit like that.

  Staring down at the glossy picture on his desk, he kept seeing the superimposed image of what she had looked like in death.

  This here … what had been done to her … that was evil.

  And more than likely, it was somebody in his town doing it.

  It fucking pissed him off.

  “She looks so young.”

  Nielson looked up, met the deputy’s eyes. It was Ethan Sheffield, one of his youngest deputies, and one of his greenest. He had a sharp mind, though. Nielson just hoped his instincts were right about this one. “The man who killed her didn’t care that she’s young,” Nielson said softly. “He didn’t care that she had her whole life ahead of her, didn’t care about anything but the fact that he wanted her.”

  “Why?”

  Nielson shifted his focus to Keith and lifted a brow. “Why?”

  “Yes. Why did he want her?” Keith leaned forward and plucked the picture off the desk. “We don’t have the slick equipment, the profilers, the brains the State boys are going to have, or the Feds. Which means we just have our own instincts, what we know. We need to figure out why he wanted her.”

  Nielson smiled and leaned back in his seat. “Yes. We need to figure that out.” He stroked a hand down his jaw and murmured, “We might not have the slick equipment, the profilers, or the high dollar brains, but we don’t need high dollar degrees to use the brains we have. Not a one of you is stupid. That’s why you’re in here. We need to figure out just why he wanted her.”

  Then he leaned forward and stared at the woman’s face.

  There was something about her face that bothered him—something that had been bothering him ever since he’d seen the driver’s license photo. A few days earlier, he’d gotten a much better photo, though, a more recent one, a casual one—one that had sent cold chills down his spine.

&n
bsp; Her eyes were hazel and in the picture, she wore a pair of wire-rimmed glasses, but the face itself …

  Blowing out a sigh, he riffled through the files on his desk until he found the right one. Inside, there was another photograph. The woman in it was a few years older, though it didn’t really show.

  They both had the same clear, pale skin, similar bone structure. Even the hair color was similar and it was an unusual shade. In the picture, the woman’s hair appeared to be longer, pulled back and up. It had been much shorter when they had found her, but that didn’t mean much.

  He tugged on his lip as he scanned a report until he found the rest of the information he needed.

  Height was almost dead-on. Weight, just a few pounds’ difference.

  Taking the second picture, he turned it around and placed it next to the picture he’d recently received of Jolene Hollister’s. Then he looked at his men.

  “What do you see?”

  A little piece of gold shouldn’t weigh that much.

  Sighing, Ezra King sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the gold cross. He’d found it half-buried in the mud a couple of weeks ago, a dozen yards or so away from his house. His house had been going up in flames at the time.

  “You going to tell me what’s got you all broody and down?” A soft, strong hand stroked up his back and he glanced over his shoulder just in time to see Lena’s naked torso right before she pressed up against him, nuzzling his cheek.

  Her arms came around him and he smiled. “Hey, I wake up in bed next to a beautiful woman. What do I have to be down about?”

  “Ezra.” She pressed her cheek against his and just waited.

  It was almost eerie, how well she knew him. Already.

  They’d only been together a few weeks. A couple months ago, he hadn’t even known her. A little over a year ago, he’d still been working with the state police in Lexington.