H.E.A.T. Book Bundle (H.E.A.T. Books 1-3)

by Nicola Claire

  “Yes, sir. His coping mechanisms aren’t the same as ours.”

  Silence again.

  I’d realised something today, watching my father hide his anger behind an icy shield. I’d realised that whatever had made him into who he had become after my mother had died, had been because of rage. A fury so large he lashed himself down with exquisite control. Cutting himself off from all triggers. Me. Anyone who looked or dressed or acted like my mother. The Irreverent Inferno was his stage, but not his cover.

  The murderer was using Sweet Hell’s darker side to hide what he had done.

  “The Irreverent Inferno is the murderer’s protection, his screen,” I added. “My father uses it as his platform. He is not hiding behind it, he’s employing it to help strengthen his control.”

  That was as good as they were going to get out of me. If they wanted more, they could do what my father had initially suggested and have Hart question him. Privately.

  I had no obligation to protect my father. He’d been absent from my life for six long years. And even before that, he’d been an icicle that split my world in two. Before my mother died and afterwards. I owed him nothing.

  But I still couldn’t sell his secrets in order to satisfy my superior’s demands.

  I was awash in grey and I’d chosen to be, purposefully.

  “OK, so how do the HEAT arsonist and the Marcrofts fit together?” Pierce asked, once again coming to my rescue. If we made it out of this fiasco and I still had a job in CIB, I was asking to team up with this man. Permanently.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But a guess would be one is using the other. The HEAT arsonist, let’s just call him Falkner for now. His intention has been to get back at Damon all along. What better way than lure his sister into that hell. Then make Damon follow her there. The murder happened unexpectedly, at least for Falkner, but this is a guy who’s not afraid to use whatever comes to hand to help him out. He chose to set Cawfield onto Damon by implicating him in Samantha Hayes’ death. Just to fuck with him. But whether Falkner knows who did it, I can’t be sure.”

  “This does raise one pertinent question, however,” Hart added. Every eye turned to him. “Where exactly were you when the victim was killed?” His eyes were on Damon.

  I couldn’t believe it. After everything we’d been through we were still going back to this. Damon had left my house at four, and had arrived at HEAT after five a.m. He didn’t have an alibi.

  “I was driving to work,” Damon announced.

  “It took you an hour from Keen’s house to Pitt Street?” Hart pressed.

  Damon shrugged. “I drove around for a while.”

  “Why?” I asked, having not heard this before.

  “Looking for Carole.”

  “K Road,” I said, understanding dawning.

  He nodded. “I went in search of Eagle.”

  “But you didn’t find him.”

  “No.”

  “So, no alibi,” Hart concluded.

  “And no doubt picked up on CCTV footage in your distinctive HEAT vehicle on the road where the murder occurred at around the time it did as well,” Pierce offered, sounding pissed off. For Damon? Or because Damon had just landed himself back in the hot seat complicating our suspects list?

  “Look, this is all irrelevant, because Damon didn’t do it,” I pointed out.

  “Jesus, Keen,” Pierce muttered as Hart said, voice hard, “And yet he’s now a suspect. Again.”

  That’s it. I’d had enough. I stood up from my chair, making Pierce rise as well in preparation to hold me back, no doubt. But Hart just crossed his arms over his chest and stared me down, unperturbed.

  “He’s being framed by Falkner!”

  “No one’s framing him, he chose to go to Karangahape Road in search of one of your informants at exactly the same time Samantha Hayes was killed,” Hart explained succinctly.

  “Coincidence!” I growled and silence met my outburst.

  “Look,” Hart said eventually. “I’m with you on the Marcrofts possibly being tangled up in this. I even believe you’re on to something with the HEAT arsonist motives and Carole Michaels involvement. But I can’t overlook this avenue either. I just can’t.”

  “Are you arresting me?” Damon asked, reasonably. Too reasonably.

  “Not yet,” Hart snapped. “But don’t go too far.”

  “Very well,” Damon replied, standing from his seat and straightening his dinner jacket. He looked immaculate. He looked stunning. He didn’t look like a fireman or a fire investigator. But unfortunately murder does not distinguish itself by fashion. “I’ll advise my lawyer you may be in touch.”

  He turned and walked to the door.

  “Damon, hold on,” I said, starting after him.

  “Let him go, Keen,” Hart ordered, halting my feet in their track.

  “Sir?”

  “I said, let him go.”

  Damon’s eyes caught mine as he turned to close the door after him. Understanding, which broke my heart, in the deep brown that looked back.

  The door clicked closed and I still stood there.

  “We need to discuss whether to bring in the Marcrofts or try for more evidence first,” Hart announced.

  “We’ve only identified three of the hooded figures, that Michaels pictured the other night,” Pierce advised, “and none of them have offered anything up that could aid us. That NDA is silencing them good.”

  I saw Pierce, out of the corner of my eye, watching me as he spoke. But my focus was really on that closed door.

  “How’s your relationship holding up with the son?” Hart asked. “Kyan Marcroft,” he added, the question clearly for me.

  “Not good,” I said, my answer automatic. My back still to Hart, my eyes on the door.

  “Maybe you could approach him in a neutral setting,” Hart offered.

  “The banquet was neutral,” Pierce pointed out.

  “No, that was a room full of all the suspects in a very public environment,” Hart argued, ignoring my statue-like performance completely.

  “So, a coffee?” Pierce queried. “You think that will work?”

  “Worth a try,” Hart replied.

  “On it,” I said and sprang for the door.

  I didn’t look back. And I didn’t pause long enough to close the door. So I heard Hart’s words clearly.

  “Not even two full minutes,” he mused. “I’d pegged her running after five.”

  “Things have changed,” Pierce replied before I made the far side of CIB. “Keen’s all grown up now, boss.”

  “Don’t call me boss,” was the last grumble I heard as I hurtled down the hallway after Damon.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “Keen’s all grown up now, boss.”

  What those two were playing at, I had no idea. But I wouldn’t put it past Inspector Hart to have had an ulterior motive to that strange last minute conversation. Sure, he wanted me to question Kyan again, somewhere where I could get him to open up, quietly.

  But he also didn’t reprimand me for vacating his office without leave. He ran a tight ship. My actions just now were insubordinate. Yet, he’d carried on a conversation with Ryan Pierce as though they were sitting around drinking beers at a barbecue.

  He’d known I’d go after Damon. He didn’t stop me. Therefore Inspector David Hart had plans.

  I caught up to Damon in the public carpark where he had parked his HEAT truck. He’d just opened his driver’s side door when I came barrelling up to him; breathless, flushed, and probably looking a little wild in my out of fashion ball gown, no make-up, and wayward hair.

  “Damon,” I said, but he must have known I was there. Even I couldn't hear a damn thing other than my gasps for much needed air.

  “Let’s not do this right now, Lara,” he said, not turning around to face me. He folded his frame into the driver’s seat, all long limbs and lithe body, wrapped up in a beautiful package.

  “Ignore Hart,” I urged. “He’s got to say those
things. The fact he hasn’t arrested you already means he’s got jack shit.”

  “I’m tired of defending myself,” he said, slipping his seatbelt on as though he was going to leave.

  I walked up to his open door and stood there, making it impossible for him to shut it before he drove off. I could smell his cologne. I could feel his addictive heat. I wanted to touch him. To reach out and burn my hand. I wanted him so much it actually hurt.

  “I believe you.”

  “I know you do,” he said, surprising me. “But I’m just so fucking frustrated right now, I can’t think.”

  “Don’t push me out,” I pleaded.

  “Lara,” he said, a sigh chasing my name on his lips. “Love, you’ve got a job to do and right now I’m on it. It’s better if I stay away.”

  “Bullshit,” I spat on a harsh whisper. “You are not my job.”

  He looked up at me, the late afternoon sun just at the right angle to make him have to raise his hand and shield his eyes. His cuff link glinted in the light, dazzling me for a second. I shifted. I told myself it was because of being blinded, but it was a lie. It was because I was uncomfortable with his silence and hard stare.

  “No, I’m not your job,” he said levelly. So much left unsaid with those simple words. My job was my life. It always had been. Carl had been entangled in that philosophy as well.

  Not anymore.

  I reached out and wrapped a hand around his wrist, changing the angle of his cuff link so I could see him clearly, and seeking that delicious heat I craved at the same time. I licked my lips and looked into his dark eyes, then willed myself to say something. Anything. Whatever was needed to keep him from running away.

  “You’re more important than my job, Damon. My job just fills the empty spaces inside my head. You fill the empty spaces in my heart. I’m not saying I would do well if I didn’t have CIB. Actually,” I admitted on a small laugh,” I don’t think I’d do too well at all. But I’d do worse without you. You keep me sane. Keep me healthy.” Keep Carl away. Make me forget my father. “I need you both,” I finished.

  Please don’t make me choose.

  “Come here,” he whispered, voice deep and speaking to parts of me best left at home and not on display in a police carpark.

  I shifted closer anyway.

  “No, Lara,” he said. “Come… here.”

  I swallowed, took the last step necessary to bring me alongside his seat, and leaned my face down.

  His free hand came up and cupped my cheek, a calloused thumb gently brushing across heated skin. Then his lips pressed to mine, tongue seeking, teeth nibbling, that thumb entering the side of my mouth and holding me still; like a vice.

  I made a sound, that really should not have been on display in a police carpark. He reciprocated, delving his tongue in deeper in a rhythm I couldn’t deny was making me all kinds of hot. Then he pulled back, looked into my eyes and sighed, his forehead coming to rest against mine.

  “I hate this,” he whispered. “Not knowing. She’s out there, probably addicted again. To all of it. The drugs, the sex, him.”

  “Tell me about him,” I urged, still bent over so his head could rest against mine. The hand that had slipped his thumb into my mouth in a move that did all kinds of wicked things to my insides, was now wrapped around the back of my neck. The other had fingers laced with mine down by my thigh.

  “He owned her,” he admitted. “In every single way. She was addicted to him as much as the substances. He fuelled her desires and then trapped her with them.”

  “Were they exclusive?”

  He pulled back and rested his head on the headrest of his driver’s seat. The absence of his heat and touch was almost debilitating. Talk of ownership seemed to only make the void he’d just created by pulling back too real.

  “She was strictly controlled, so for her exclusivity was a given. But I’m not so sure about him. He had a small entourage, but he was definitely seen on the club circuit. Sometimes with Carole, sometimes not.”

  “Someone must know more about him than just his alias,” I pointed out.

  “I never had a chance to look too deeply,” Damon admitted. “By the time I realised what sort of relationship it was, and how damaging it had become to Carole, I pulled her out and then he disappeared.”

  Damon was a good investigator, but he wasn’t a cop. He didn’t have the suspicious mind of a police detective who had seen too many dark and dangerous things. His investigations were often undertaken after the fact. And rarely stretched into motive.

  Andrew Falkner, for want of a real name to call him, would have believed Carole was his property. And Damon had stolen her. Revenge was obvious. But not for a fire investigator. I would have checked Falkner out before going in. I would have done my homework. But then, Carole wasn’t my sister.

  “Listen,” I said. “Hart wants me to corner Kyan Marcroft and try for something solid again on Samantha Hayes. Falkner is involved in the Irreverent Inferno, he had to be, to give Cawfield that much guidance.” Damon grimaced, but didn’t comment. So, I forged on. “I can try to push Kyan on that angle as well as the murder case.”

  “Is that wise?”

  “Probably not,” I admitted. “But I’m doing it.”

  “Is it what a detective would normally do?” Damon pressed.

  “It’s what this detective will do.”

  “Lara.”

  “Damon.”

  He shook his head, but there was a smile on his lips now. It reached his eyes.

  “There’s something you can do too,” I said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Go back in.”

  “Hart won’t want me near the Irreverent Inferno and Carole will be long gone by now.”

  “Last night there were twenty seven members in attendance, including the initiates. The night before there were twenty-six. The difference was Cawfield. Which leads us to believe that the stable number of attendees is twenty-six. He was there, Damon. And if he was there, then Carole’s not far from him.”

  “That’s when she calls you,” he guessed.

  “She has some freedom, that’s obvious. But she’s too scared to really use it.”

  “Fuck!” he said, slamming his hand down on the steering wheel and almost bending it.

  “Go back in. If there’s twenty-six attendees, he’s there.”

  “You trust me to hold it together.”

  “I’d trust you with my life.”

  He blinked. His fingers flexed around the steering wheel. His voice was gruff when he spoke.

  “I want you. Right now.”

  I smiled, my body tingling. “Police carparks aren’t generally a good place to ‘park up.’”

  “Ha ha,” he shot back. Then sobered. “I don’t know how long she’s got.”

  “I don’t know how long we’ve got before the murderer strikes again,” I countered. “The first act was showy. A performance he was prepared to undertake across the street from an open gaming club. A club he is most certainly a member of. He staged the body. Crucified her. She was paying for her sins, or his, I’m unsure. But whoever did this will be in the Irreverent Inferno tonight. I know it. The nine circles of Hell. He’s tested himself on each one. He’s already reached his version of Paradise. What happens now?”

  “He enjoys it,” Damon whispered.

  “And enjoyment for him involves breath control play on a grand public scale. This man will perform again. You can count on it.”

  “And Carole could be there.”

  “I can’t see it,” I said, shaking my head. “If what you’ve said about Falkner is true, everything he’s done is to get her back. Why put her in a position to be harmed?”

  “He put her on that fucking altar and let a stranger do disgusting things to her in front of hooded men.”

  “And then beat up the man who did those things to her, almost killing him,” I pointed out. “Maybe he regretted it. Maybe it was punishment for escaping him, and now she’s paid. But eithe
r way I can’t see it.”

  “Lara, he owns her. To keep or throw away.”

  Fuck, maybe Damon had seen dark and dangerous things in his line of work. Maybe he wasn’t as shut off from my world as I’d thought.

  “Then you need to go back there,” I said, feeling a strange sense of despair that he would jump to such a conclusion. Even as it justified my fucked up world.

  “OK, but the batteries on the cameras and mics are flat.”

  I glanced at my watch and then slipped my cellphone out of my handbag. I had it to my ear before Damon could raise an eyebrow in query. Carmel answered on the fourth ring.

  “Anscombe Securities and Investigations. How can I help?”

  “Hi, Carmel. This is Detective Lara Keen. May I please speak with Nick Anscombe?”

  Damon snorted at my overly polite greeting and request. I turned my back on him or I’d give myself away.

  “Of course, Detective,” the gatekeeper said in a matching false polite tone. “One moment please.”

  Too easy. It had been too easy.

  Then the phone clicked and went dead.

  Motherfucker! She did not just do that.

  My cellphone rang while I was staring at it in shock. The name on the screen was “ASI.”

  “Keen,” I growled down the line. “That was rude. What the fuck do they teach you at receptionist school? How the hell you keep your job, I don’t know.”

  “Detective,” Nick Anscombe’s recognisable deep voice said. “You wanted me?”

  I tipped my head back and closed my eyes.

  “I’m not fond of your receptionist,” I admitted.

  “No shit,” he shot back. “I think the feeling might be mutual.”

  “Yeah, well,” I said, in way of apology.

  “Carmel’s part of the furniture, Detective,” Nick said. “You get used to her.”

  Unlikely, but I finally held my tongue.

  “Need your help,” I advised.

  “I wouldn’t have guessed.”

  “Damon’s going back into the Irreverent Inferno, he’s on his way to you now to change the batteries in his gear.”

  “Pierce hasn’t sanctioned this.”