Pure Vengeance (On the Line Romantic Thriller Series Book 1)

by Lori Ryan

  She stepped in, toe to toe with him. “You’re closing your eyes and that’s a dangerous thing for an investigator to do. We can’t afford that on this case.”

  “Incident room. Now,” he ground out and turned without waiting for her to answer. She didn’t waste time. Taking this to the incident room wouldn’t change matters. He needed to see what the hell was right in front of him, and if she needed to be the one to get him to do that, so be it.

  Cal watched Eve’s face as she entered the room. She didn’t give him a chance to say squat as she lit into him. But he wasn’t listening to her words. It was her face that told him the story. For some reason, she was closed off. She was shutting him out and he didn’t know why. Sure, she was pissed about his position on Tanner and she wanted to change his mind, but he’d be willing to bet there was more going on here.

  “You know damned well I’m right,” she was saying. “You can’t run a proper investigation if you don’t question every suspect. At the very least, we have to clear him if we’re going to build a solid case against someone else.”

  Cal shook his head. “Tanner isn’t a suspect.”

  “You’re not thinking about this as a detective.” She was all hands-on-hips and in his face, but somehow, there seemed to be a mile between them. And he didn’t like that one bit.

  “You’re wrong. I’m thinking about this exactly as a detective would. I know Tanner. I can look past the fact that his qualifications say he has the skill to be this shooter. I’m looking at his ability to do it. And he doesn’t have it. He’s a damned good cop. You pull him in here, you’ll be smearing his name. You’ll put a mark on him that won’t ever go away, even if we clear him.”

  “Then let me ask you this. Why haven’t you just gone and asked him where he was on those dates? Why haven’t you just gone and had a talk with him?”

  Okay, she had a point there. But he wanted to find out what was going on with her first. Then he’d go deal with Tanner. “Why are you picking a fight with me today? Tell me that and then we can talk about Tanner.”

  He could see her defenses go up, clear as day. She was putting up walls like the ones she’d had when they’d first met. “I’ve got an opinion, so now I’m picking a fight?” Her voice cranked up and she closed in, moving toward him. “Bullshit, Cal. You can avoid the issue all you want, but you know we have leads we aren’t following. One of your own was attacked because this sniper is tearing apart this city. If you won’t look at all the possible suspects—and I mean give them a good, hard look—then the fact that one of your own is in the hospital right now is on you.”

  He covered the pain of her statement with anger and growled, deep and low in his chest. “Cut the shit, Eve, and tell me what the hell is going on. I get that you have an opinion and I respect it. We can talk about Tanner. We can figure out a way to clear him. But you need to tell me what the hell is going on. What the hell is happening with us. I know we can’t start a relationship while we’re working together, but you’re shutting me out right now, and I don’t like it.”

  He watched as something in her expression seemed to shift and she softened. “I don’t want this.”

  He had a bad feeling about the direction the conversation was about to head. “Don’t want what?”

  “Us. This. Whatever it is. I don’t want to worry and panic about you when I hear a cop is hurt on the job. I don’t want the feeling I just felt when I didn’t know if you were okay.” She seemed almost desperate to turn off what she was feeling. The only problem was, there was no turning it off, at least not on his end, and he had to suspect it wouldn’t be easy on her end either.

  Cal stepped closer, putting his hands on her arms, not holding her in place, but gently rubbing up and down. “Let me ask you something. If you were to walk away right now, would that feeling stop for you? Would you still panic if you heard someone wearing the uniform had been hurt and you didn’t know if it was me?”

  She seemed to deflate a little. “No.”

  “It’s too late, Eve. The feelings are already there. It’s just what we choose to do with them now that matters. But making them go away isn’t one of the choices we can make.”

  She looked toward the door, staring at it as if she might still try to outrun what she felt.

  “Eve. Give this a chance. When the case is over, just give us a chance.”

  Blue eyes turned back to him. He held her gaze, knowing he couldn’t push her any more than he had. He needed to let her come to this on her own.

  “I don’t know, Cal. I—”

  He squeezed her arms and leaned in for the smallest kiss. Just a touch of the lips, really. Nothing more. “Just think about it. Don’t answer now.”

  “I need to tell you something.”

  Cal froze. That wasn’t the kind of thing a man wanted to hear. His mind flipped through possibilities. She was married. Maybe dating someone.

  She didn’t wait for an answer. “The guy in charge of the Genesio task force, Dyson—”

  “Yeah,” he said, a tingling feeling slinking up his spine. She’d talked about him before.

  “He’s been pressuring me to date him.”

  Cal felt so many things at once. Burning anger that someone would try to pull that shit on her. He knew how much being on that task force meant to her. He could only imagine how this guy had threatened to take her off the case if she didn’t date him. But the other thing that hit him full force was the idea that she might think he was like this guy. That he’d try to force her in some way.

  “Eve, I would never—”

  She shook her head. “I know you wouldn’t, Cal. I can tell the difference. The thing is,” she glanced over at the still-closed door, “I’ve been handling it myself. I don’t want people looking at me the way they’ll look at me once I report him. Like maybe I asked for it somehow. Like maybe I started something with him and then reported him when things didn’t go the way I wanted them to.”

  “And being involved with me will only increase the chances people will think that.”

  She didn’t confirm it. Just pressed her lips together.

  Cal cursed under his breath. “I’ll talk to him. Get him to back off.” He could hear the growl in his voice, but hell if he could control it.

  Her look stopped him cold. “The hell you will. I’ll handle it myself, Cal.”

  He sighed and rubbed at his forehead, where he could feel the start of a headache coming on. Her strength was one of the things that drew him to her, but damn, when she turned it on him, it sort of sucked. “Fine. But you’ll tell me if you need backup?” He hoped phrasing it that way would get her to see that’s all he wanted to do. To have her back.

  She nodded and set his mind at ease a hair when she came up on tiptoes and pressed a soft kiss to his mouth. It took all he had not to turn it into something more. But he knew now wasn’t the time to push her.

  They walked back out into the bullpen to find Jarrod, presumably back from sick leave and ready to reclaim his place on the team.

  Jarrod grinned and shook Cal’s offered hand. “What did I miss?”

  “You cleared for work?” It was impossible not to notice the sling on Jarrod’s arm, not to mention the shaved back of his head where they’d had to sew him up.

  “In here I am. Can’t go out on the street yet.” Jarrod looked to Eve. “Having fun working with the big guy?”

  “If you want to call it that.” Eve looked back to Cal. “I need to look into a few things. I’ll touch base with you guys later.”

  Cal felt a rock settle deep in his gut at her words, but he watched her walk away without a word. Being with Eve Sands was going to push him on every level he knew. He couldn’t step in and fix things the way he wanted to. He couldn’t push and shove like hell for what he wanted. He had to wait and be patient and let her do things in her own time, her own way. He almost laughed at the irony of it. The very strength that made him want her so badly seemed like it just might drive him mad.

  Chap
ter Twenty-Eight

  Cal turned back to find Jarrod watching him. If Jarrod could tell he was way off balance, he didn’t show it. Maybe that meant he was hiding it well. He’d been pissed as hell at Eve when she’d said Officer Morgan’s injury was on him. But the truth was, she wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t know.

  Ed Morgan was a good cop, and yes, Cal was responsible for what had happened to him. If he’d put this sniper away, Ed wouldn’t be lying in the hospital right now with God knows what injuries. He’d be going home to his kids tonight.

  Cal lived with Ray Faulk’s death every damned day. He needed to end this thing now before he had another cop’s death on his hands.

  The door to the unit flew open, hitting the wall and rattling the room. Cal looked up to see Detectives Cafferty and Reynolds enter. Reynolds stormed down the hall, presumably to the john where he’d be working to get himself under control. Everyone in the place was familiar with his temper. He never took it out on victims, or even suspects in most cases. He’d taken anger management classes, though. The result of those had been him abusing the crap out of the door and standing in the bathroom grinding his teeth while he counted to one hundred. Sometimes two or three hundred.

  Cafferty walked over to where Cal and Jarrod stood, lifting his chin at Jarrod. “You back?”

  “On the desk for now.” He didn’t have to say how much he hated the idea. They all hated sitting at a desk. Jarrod offered a head tilt of his own in the direction of Cafferty’s wayward partner. “What set Reynolds off?”

  Cafferty ran a hand down his face and Cal could see the exhaustion in every crease and line crisscrossing the other man’s expression. “Went to arrest the bastard our witness fingered for the James killings.”

  Jarrod grunted. “Heard it turned out to be the woman’s boyfriend?” Cal wasn’t surprised Jarrod had been keeping tabs on what was happening at the precinct. They all hated being out, no matter the reason.

  Cafferty nodded. “She was afraid he’d come after her if she talked. Took a lot of coaxing to get her to give him up.”

  “You get him?” Cal asked. They all needed good news.

  Cafferty didn’t give them any, shaking his head instead. “Found the guy gutted like a pig.”

  “What?” Jarrod and Cal asked, and Cal heard murmurs from the other detectives who’d come closer to hear what Cafferty had to say. The James case had been wearing on all of them. It didn’t matter that Cafferty and Reynolds were the leads on the case. A lot of them had worked aspects of it, and those who hadn’t had been pulling for them to solve it as if it were their own.

  “Someone got to him before we did. We pulled in just as uniforms were responding to a call from one of his neighbors. Lady found him in the stairwell of their apartment building this morning. She went out to do her laundry and found him.”

  “Are you shitting me?” Jarrod’s tone reflected the shock let-down they all likely felt. To wait that long to get this guy and then have the satisfaction of bringing him in taken from them sucked.

  “Mugging gone bad?” Cal asked, letting the irony in his voice bleed through given what they’d been looking to arrest the guy on. “Can’t be.” None of them liked coincidence as an explanation, and that sure as hell didn’t sound viable.

  “Cash and cards in his wallet,” Cafferty supplied with a shake of his head. No way that was a mugging.

  “Drug deal?” one of the other detectives offered.

  Cafferty acknowledged the possibility. “I don’t know. Could be, but it looked to me like someone was lying in wait. The lightbulb in the light was broken. Given its cage, that shouldn’t have happened by accident. Could be vandals though.”

  “That could be a jealous boyfriend or husband. Someone who wanted to target him for something. The guy hardly sounds like an honorable guy.”

  “Weapon?” Cal asked.

  “None found. Waiting for results, obviously, but Doc Kane thinks we’re looking for a very large hunting knife. I’ve got uniforms checking the area, but I’m guessing our killer took it with him.” He didn’t have to tell them the uniforms would check garbage cans, dumpsters, and alleyways for the weapon. Sewer drains were also popular places to ditch a weapon. Sadly, the possibilities were many.

  “Could it be another vigilante? Someone who got wind that he was the James killer and took matters into their own hands?” Cal asked, the hair on the back of his neck standing up. Why did he feel like they were losing control of their city?

  “Copying our sniper?” Cafferty asked, a frown creasing his face. He looked as if he liked the idea less than Cal, but he also didn’t seem to have much of an argument against it.

  “Yeah. I hate to say it, but that could be.” Jarrod put in. “We might be looking at more vigilante killers coming out of the woodwork. Our sniper could be emboldening other people to act.”

  “How would someone have found out his identity?” Reynolds asked quietly, having joined the group moments before. “We only just got the news ourselves. I sent our witness to stay at her mom’s in New York while we picked him up. Put her on the train myself yesterday.”

  Jarrod and Cal offered nearly identical shrugs. “She could have talked,” said Cal. “Told a friend before she came in here. The friend told a friend and so on.”

  “Or the vic talked himself. Bragged about being the James killer and it came back to haunt him?” Cafferty offered.

  “It’s karma. Who gives a fuck who killed him?” Jepsen put in, then looked around. Apparently, the talk from the Captain hadn’t done squat to slow his mouth down. “What? You’re all thinking it.”

  There were more than a few murmurs at that.

  Cal turned to the Captain’s office, watching as the older man spoke into the phone, one hand scrubbing up and down the back of his head. It had to be a blow, not being able to walk the James killer in here in cuffs for the press to see.

  But even more, it was entirely possible they had another vigilante copying their sniper. Cal ran a hand down the back of his own head. He could feel the Captain’s pain today. And he didn’t like it.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Eve walked into the FBI building knowing her excuse for going there was just that. An excuse. She was going to do some follow-up on a few leads, and she’d update Supervisory Special Agent Carter on the sniper task force. All things that needed to be done, but she could have done them from the police station. She just needed some space to breathe. To get her bearings for a short time before heading back over and getting back in the game.

  She used her keycard to enter the floor where she worked and headed down the hall.

  “I don’t know, Deb. You talk and it’s your word against his. Word gets out and you’ll be the one to be labeled difficult to get along with, or worse. They’ll say you started it and then got upset when he rejected you. It’s how these things work. Maybe it’s better to call his bluff and hope he doesn’t actually try anything?” Eve slowed at the female voice in the break room, knowing it was Carole Ann, one of the administrative support staff.

  Deb, a quiet woman Eve knew to be raising three kids alone, was next to speak, and her voice was a little shaky. “I didn’t get the sense he was bluffing. I really think he’ll find a way to get me fired. And I need this job, Carole Ann. I can’t risk that.”

  Eve didn’t have to think twice about who they were talking about or what she should do. The threats Deb was under were too close to the ones she’d heard herself. The ones Dyson had made. He couldn’t legitimately threaten her job, but he’d hinted at having her taken off the Genesio task force. Apparently, with her refusing his advances and being moved temporarily to work with the New Haven PD, he’d moved onto to someone who was in a more vulnerable position.

  What Deb had said was true. She had three kids to feed and her position in the bureau wasn’t lateral to Dyson’s the way Eve’s was. Dyson held a lot more power over Deb than he did over Eve.

  Eve turned and walked in the other direction. She’d
been thinking she was strong for sticking up to Dyson and handling the situation herself. It had never occurred to her that she was doing the wrong thing. Although looking at it with fresh eyes, she should have seen it. Hell, how many times had she told a victim of rape she was doing the right thing reporting the crime? That the actions the woman was taking would keep other women from suffering the same fate at the hands of her attacker?

  It was almost laughable that she hadn’t seen it that way before. If she didn’t speak out about Dyson, Deb would be left to either give in to his demands or stand up to him on her own and risk exactly what Eve hadn’t wanted for herself.

  Eve took a breath and walked into SSA Carter’s office. He was expecting an update on the task force, and she’d give him one, but she’d also be reporting Dyson’s sexual harassment. She had a feeling she wouldn’t be the only one to come forward. Maybe there would be safety in the numbers. Either way, she needed to stop hiding behind the myth of being strong enough to handle it herself. The strength would be in coming forward and speaking up.

  Chapter Thirty

  Cal never made it to talk to Jake Tanner. He felt like his city was burning down around him. There were no flames, no cars or buildings going up in smoke, but it was burning down just the same. The call came in that afternoon. A cop had been hit by their sniper. And Cal knew without being told whose head that was on. It was on him.

  Jarrod was seething when the Captain wouldn’t let him leave the building, but there hadn’t been time to argue. Cal called Eve and told her to get to the scene as he drove out to the small gas station on Chapel.

  He didn’t wait for her as he walked up to the officers on scene. Once again, he was coming into things too late to do a damned thing about it. That had been one of the hard things about moving from uniform to detective. It meant you came in after the fact and had to clean up the mess. Sure, he was usually able to solve crimes and put away the worst of the worst before they could harm someone else, but there was always that moment when you walked on scene, when you thought, why the fuck couldn’t we stop this before it happened?