Carson nodded. “But I bet there’s something that connects them.”
“Like being homeless,” Jaylon offered.
“Could be that, could be something else. We know Mia was a drug addict. Was Art one or an alcoholic?”
Aaron shook his head. “The autopsy didn’t show signs of liver cirrhosis, but we really don’t know him well enough to know if he was alcoholic or not. Many homeless vets are.”
Brianna picked up her phone. “I can ask Paula.”
“Please don’t,” Carson said, stopping her. “I’d like to talk with her in person. Do you think she’ll be up to it?”
“Getting her home from the hospital wore her out this morning,” Brianna said. “But I don’t see why she couldn’t answer some questions later this afternoon.”
“Good. I’ll meet you at the safehouse then.” He turned back to Stedaman. “In the meantime, I’d like to talk with Investigator Ramos again. Then I may have a preliminary working profile on your guy this evening.”
“Okay. Let’s meet back here at about seven. That will give us time to get more information and dinner,” Stedaman stood and the rest followed. He looked at Jaylon. “Halloway, I’ll reassign your active cases temporarily to someone else. You’re gonna be needed on this thing. I want you to start searching missing persons reports for the past six months.”
“What am I looking for?” he asked.
“Missing homeless people.”
Jaylon groaned. “No one reports homeless people being missing.”
“I know. It sucks, but someone has to do it,” the captain said. “But if we only find one, that’s one more person to possibly add to our profiler’s list.”
“Damn. Put it like that Captain, I’m not sure if I want to find one or not.”
* * *
“How’s our girl doing?” Flora asked when Brianna entered the shelter’s administration office after noon.
Brianna smiled. Flora was very tiny, maybe four-foot-ten if she stood on her toes. From the mountains of eastern Virginia—a little rural town called Grundy—she hadn’t had an easy life growing up but seemed to always have a smile ready to brighten your day. She reminded Brianna of those fairy godmothers in one of those cartoon movies.
“They let her come home this morning.” Brianna set her bag on the desk, sat in her chair and opened her computer. “She’s doing much better than when we found her Wednesday. Her breathing isn’t so wheezy and she’s not coughing as much. And her fever broke last night, so the antibiotics must be working.”
“Does she have anyone to help her?” Flora immediately shifted from happy pixie to worried mama cat. Unable to have any kids of her own, she’d always been like the house mother to the women who’d come to the shelter, no matter their age or circumstance. She might be little, but she could hug like a thousand-pound grizzly bear—often, just what the women needed. “I could come over and check on her after work.”
Brianna hated disappointing her, but she couldn’t let her compromise Paula’s safety, no matter how well intentioned her friend might be. And what she was going to tell her next wouldn’t be any easier.
“Paula can’t have any visitors right now, Flora.”
“Oh, is she contagious? You know I have some face masks. I could just put one on and pop in to see her. I won’t stay too long.”
“No. That’s not it. And what I’m going to tell you can’t leave this room, okay?”
Suddenly serious, Flora pushed out of her office chair, marched to the door and closed it quietly before taking her seat once more. “Okay. Tell me whatever it is. You know I won’t say a word.”
And Brianna did know that. Flora held more secrets than the CIA and was much better at keeping them. She once explained that her mother told her, “Flora, when someone shares a secret with you, you are honor-bound to keep it to yourself. No matter if they share it with the whole world, it isn’t your secret to share.”
“Paula can’t have visitors because she’s in a safehouse as a witness in a murder investigation.”
Flora’s eyes grew wide with shocked surprise. “Murder? Whose?”
“A homeless man who she befriended.” Brianna reached out and took Flora’s hand in hers. “And I have some really bad news, the same person who killed Paula’s friend has also killed…” She paused blinking back the tears and swallowing the lump in her throat. “Also killed Mia.”
“No!” Flora pulled her hand away and covered her mouth with both hands.
Brianna leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Flora. It was her turn to give this woman the bear hug. After her tears and trembling stopped, Brianna sat back and handed her a tissue from the box on her desk. “I’m so sorry I had to be the one to tell you.”
“No, no. I’d want to know,” Flora said wiping away the tears. “Do they know who did it? How she died?”
“We don’t know the who. And as for the how.” Brianna shook her head. “I can’t tell you anything about it now.”
“So, your detective thinks the person who killed Paula’s friend killed Mia?”
“It’s looking that way.”
“When did this happen? I haven’t seen anything on the news.”
“It won’t be. At least we hope to keep it out of the news as much as possible.” Brianna paused to inhale and exhale slowly before continuing. “We think they were both victims of a serial killer.”
“Oh, God.”
Brianna nodded, her lips pressed into a thin line. It was just too surreal to think of, except she knew it to be the truth.
“Was she…was she raped?” Flora managed to get out.
“No,” Brianna hurried to reassure her. “We don’t think that’s this guy’s purpose. At least the profiler hasn’t said so. And as to when, well that’s a bit of a question we’re hoping you can help us determine.”
It was one of the reasons she’d come into work today. Besides making sure all the staff’s paychecks were set to be deposited next Thursday—the most important thing in accounting, you don’t mess with people’s money—she and Aaron wanted to get any information they could out of Flora about that last meeting with Mia. Because of the shelter’s extensive security protocols Aaron couldn’t come inside to talk with Flora, and Brianna didn’t want to pull her away from the shelter since they were already short-handed with Paula out, so not only telling her about Mia’s death, but questioning her about their friend fell to Brianna.
“I’ll do anything I can,” Flora said, clenching her hands in her lap, “but I haven’t seen Mia since I ran into her last October.”
“That’s what I want to ask about. Exactly where did you see her?” Brianna pulled out a pad of paper and a pen for notes.
“It was at a Browns’ tailgate party outside the stadium. Phil and I had gotten tickets for the game and were meeting some friends early on to eat and do a little Browns cheering before the game.”
“Which day was it?”
Flora stared off into space for a moment as if trying to recall. “It was the weekend before my sister’s birthday on the twenty-fifth. I wish I could be more specific.”
“That’s okay. You’ve already narrowed it down to just a few days. And I can get the exact date from the internet” Brianna said with a half-smile. She didn’t want to stress the older woman too much and she meant what she said. Flora was already helping. “How did she seem to you?”
“Happy to see me. We hugged, of course,” Flora’s face softened at the memory, then her eyes teared up and she dabbed at them with the tissue again. “She was thin, but then she’d always been a thin little thing. But this was different. A good gust of wind could’ve blown her away like a tumbleweed. And she looked frail. Her skin pale as fine china.”
Brianna nodded sadly. “She was back on the smack.”
“I was afraid of that. She’d been doing so well when she left.” The tender-hearted Flora shook her head and stared off into space, once more fighting back her tears.
“What did you talk abou
t?” Brianna asked after a long moment, directing her back to the subject.
“She said she was doing well, going to classes. I didn’t really believe her. Not the way she was looking and how she was playing for passing change, but I did hope she would follow those plans.” Flora paused. “She said she was going to be in a magazine.”
Brianna paused her pen on the paper and drew her brows down in confusion. “A magazine? What did she mean by that?”
“I asked her what she was talking about. She said she’d been meeting with a journalist who wanted to do a series of articles about people living on the streets. He wanted one to be about her as a street musician.”
Brianna jotted that information down. “Did she tell you his name?”
Flora shook her head. “No. But Mia was excited because the man promised to pay her half the royalties if he sold the article.”
Brianna doubted that would happen. She had a friend from college who wrote freelance while working on a fiction novel. She said she had to write tons of articles just to make ends meet. “Did he say what magazine he worked for?”
“No. Just that he’d been real nice,” Flora paused. “She got that look in her eye, you know the kind young girls do when they have a crush on someone?”
Brianna turned up the corner of her lips and nodded.
“Well, she had that look, so I think not only was he nice to her, he must’ve been handsome. Anyways, I put some money in her violin case and asked her to come join us at our tailgate, but she said she had to work the crowd before they spent their money inside.” Flora shook her head. “I sent Phil back with a bag of food from the tailgaters. He said she put it in that big shoulder bag she always carried, thanked him, then asked what song he’d like her to play. Said the only one he could remember was Für Elise. He said how she played it was so hauntingly beautiful, a crowd formed” Again, she dabbed away the threatening tears. “She could do that, you know. Take a song and make it so beautiful it’d take your breath away.”
19
Memories of Mia, her music and how her last days were spent haunted Brianna as she climbed into Aaron’s SUV two hours later that day.
“How’d it go?” he asked.
Unable to talk right now, she just shook her head and stared out the window into the gunmetal grey, overcast Cleveland sky. The rainy drizzle that started just after she’d gotten to the shelter fit her mood.
Thankfully, Aaron didn’t ask another question, just turned the heat on and pulled away from the curb. She could’ve driven herself to the shelter, but he’d insisted, saying he’d feel better if she was always with someone until they found this monster. He hadn’t called him a monster. He’d called him a perpetrator. The truth was this killer was a monster. She couldn’t see him in any other way.
Mia had been a beautiful, talented young woman. Yes, she’d had her demons. Didn’t everyone?
“What gives this monster the right to take other people’s lives? What sick game is he playing that makes him feel he can just end someone’s life for his own purpose?” she asked between clenched teeth, her anger shooting out the window like a laser beam meant to destroy the surrounding buildings as they passed them.
A warm hand landed on her left one. She squeezed the fingers curled into her palm tight.
“I’m sorry you had to go through that. Telling your friend about Mia. No matter how many times I’ve had to be that person telling a victim’s loved one, it’s never easy, but it had to be harder when you know them both.”
“Dammit,” she said, suddenly realizing she was going to have to tell Paula, too.
“I can be the one to tell Paula, if you want,” he said, reading her mind.
She shook her head. “No, it will be better coming from me. It’s just this will be the second time I have to tell her someone she knows has been murdered. People go through their whole lives and never hear that. Now she’s going to hear it twice in a week.”
“You don’t need to tell her the minute we get there,” he said, still holding her hand. “I asked Kirk F to pick up some pizzas and meet us at the safehouse. Figure everyone is hungry, and it’ll be more comfortable for us to talk with Paula in a casual setting.”
Gratitude for this man’s common sense, practical thinking and compassion hit Brianna hard. She bit her lower lip to keep from giving into tears. She’d never been a big crier, not even after weeks of hospitalization and the number of surgeries she’d needed to repair her face and arm. When things were tough, she’d been tough. If she gave into Aaron’s kindness now, would she be able to get through this?
He released her hand as he pulled into the drive of the safehouse and around back to the garage. She fought the urge to grab it back like a swimmer reaching for a lifeline in a tsunami. Strong. That was what she was going to be.
“Will Special Agent Smith be meeting us here, too?” she asked as they climbed out of the SUV.
“He said he had the address from Jake and would meet us here after he was done at the coroner’s office.” Aaron reached out and grasped her elbow at the door to the house.
“What?”
“Smith asked us to wait to talk with Paula until he got here. He wants to observe her and ask his own questions.”
A little tension left her shoulders. At least she had a little reprieve before telling Paula about their friend. “Okay. I can do that.”
Aaron tugged on her arm a little, pulling her closer. Her gaze met his, compassion and comfort in his grey-green eyes. Oh, she could so use some comfort.
“Come here,” he said with another gentle tug.
“I can’t. If I do, I’ll cry, and I don’t think I’ll stop.”
“After the day you’ve had, maybe it’s just what you need to do,” he said, stepping closer to her. “Get it out of your system before we go inside.”
Conceding he might be right, she slipped into his arms and wrapped hers around his very solid and warm frame.
“I warn you, I ugly cry,” she said seconds before giving into the emotional stress of finding Mia dead and having to break the news to Flora.
How long she stayed in the warmth of his embrace, holding his solid body against hers as the tears flowed and her body trembled in her grief, she didn’t know. Long enough for someone inside the house to get worried and come check. The door opened slowly, then she felt Aaron nod and the door closed as quietly as it opened.
Great. Now everyone will know I’ve been clinging to him and bawling like a baby.
“Matt won’t say anything,” Aaron quietly said right above her ear, his left hand slowly stroking up and down her back. “Besides, we have a lot to do. You’ll focus better now that you’ve gotten this out of your system. I need you at your best if we’re going to find this guy.”
She snorted a little sardonic laugh. “Like you really need my help. I’m not like Abby and her sisters-in-law. She’s told me the stories about how they helped their husbands in solving cases. I don’t have any special skills like them, I don’t know guns or explosives or medical stuff. My whole life I’ve manipulated people to help me. Played the helpless bimbo. Trust me, I’m the least capable woman out there.”
“That’s not true,” he said, pulling back and tipping her chin up with his hand to stare down into her eyes. “You might’ve been that woman once, but you’re not now. Haven’t been for three years. You’ve been very helpful on this case. We wouldn’t even have found Art in time to start investigating and collect viable evidence without you. The rats probably would’ve had him mostly gone by the time someone stumbled across him.”
“Eww, don’t remind me of the rats.” She couldn’t help the shiver that ran through her.
“See? It’s been days since we went into that abandoned factory and this is the first time you’ve shown a reaction to the rats.” He smiled down at her. “Most women would’ve run screaming at the sight of them the other night, but you were steady and kept your head.”
“Somebody had to go in there with you and Stanley,
” she teased, lowering her gaze in embarrassment, and trying to deflect his complimentary assessment of her.
“And then this morning,” he continued, his face and voice growing more serious. “Not only did you see your second dead body in a week, but despite knowing it was a friend of yours, you focused on the situation and were able to help us establish more facts about our victims. Facts that may lead us to finding this killer. You also care. People have a way of opening up and talking to you.”
She started to protest, but he stopped her with a finger to her lips.
“Don’t deny it. Paula, Kirk F, the people at the shelters. They’ve all trusted you. You may not have military skills, but you have your own strengths,” he paused, until she was once more staring into his eyes, “strengths we’ll need to catch this guy. So, never doubt your importance to this case.”
“Okay, I won’t.” Brianna stood a little straighter, still a few inches shorter than him and brushed her hands over her eyes and cheeks, wiping away any dampness still there. “I guess I’m ready to go inside now.”
“You’re wrong, you know.”
“Wrong? I’m not ready to go inside?”
“You don’t cry ugly,” he said just before claiming her lips in an anything but comforting kiss.
Giving into the heady sensation, she pressed in closer to him, heat sizzling through her. She tilted her head, wanting more of the flavor of him, parting her lips to let her tongue dance with his. A soft moan escaped her.
Then he eased off, slowly lifting his lips from hers. When she opened her eyes, she saw a wicked gleam in his eyes.
“What?” she said, feeling her cheeks heat at his expression of male satisfaction.
“Now when you go inside, you’ll just look like you’ve been kissed.” He gave her a wink and released his hold on her to reach in the back of his SUV for his laptop case.
She shook her head, a half-smile on her face and headed for the garage door. Pausing to let him catch up with her, she said, “I’m not sure that’s an improvement.”
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