The Innocent: FBI Psychics, Book 2

by Shiloh Walker

  “Shut the hell up,” Taige said, her face tight. She gave the man in the cell a dark look. “Did you get a phone call or did they ride roughshod over your civil rights too?”

  Linc shrugged.

  “Unless a phone call fairy snuck in here, he didn’t get a call, either.” Jay gave Taige a serene smile. “I don’t think civil rights exist in this town.”

  Taige turned and stared at the deputy hanging on her heels, then she turned and looked at the officer who was glaring at every last one of them. “Are you the one who arrested them? Although whether or not it’s a legit arrest is yet to be seen. Did you read them their rights?”

  He opened his mouth and Taige just continued. “Unless that is a simple yes or no, shut your fucking mouth. You don’t want to know the sort of shit I can bring down on you.”

  He jerked up his chin. “The Feds have no jurisdiction over this. This was a simple public disturbance dispute. So you will keep a civil tongue or I’ll arrest you as well.”

  Taige cocked out a hip and rested her hand on it. “Yeah? For cussing?” She started to laugh. “You do that, boy, and I’ll be calling every news station from here to Atlanta.” A sleepy smile curved her lips. “They’ll be camped out on your lawn from now to Labor Day. Small-town police department in violation of civil rights. Federal agent arrested for saying fuck. I might even accept one of those interviews to go on the Today Show. I’ll mention you. By name.” She flicked a glance at his badge and then looked back up at him. “Now, you want to discuss whether or not they were read their rights or do I start making phone calls? Trust me, if I don’t make a phone call within the next thirty minutes, you will be getting phone calls. And think big when you consider who’ll be calling. Think FBI Headquarters out of Washington.” She smiled serenely. “Are you getting the picture yet, officer?”

  The deputy behind her started to shuffle his feet. “I think maybe it’s in our best interest to let them all out with a warning, Biff.”

  Biff narrowed his eyes to slit. “I’ll be damned if I let them out just because some FBI cunt thinks she can scare me.” He dropped his hand to his weapon. “They’ve been arrested. They’ll fucking stay in jail.”

  “And about that civil rights issue?” Taige asked softly, unconcerned with the way Biff stroked his gun.

  “What civil rights issue?” Biff looked like he wanted to spit on her.

  “Why the hell are you even wearing a badge?” She shook her head. “Were they read their rights? Given a chance to a phone call, a chance to speak with legal counsel? Is there a reason they are being detained or are you just fucking with them?”

  The deputy moved up between them. “I think maybe we need to call the chief, Biff. He ain’t gonna be happy with this.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, jerking a look between Biff, the agent and Jay, then back to the cell. “I think maybe we’ve got a misunderstanding, Agent Morgan. What I’d like to do is call the chief, see if we can work this all out—”

  “Like hell,” Biff growled. “A man’s leg was broke. There was damage caused. Federal agent or not, somebody is gonna pay for that.”

  “I’ll be happy to,” Jay said, looking at Taige through the bars. “Of course, I’ll be bringing up charges of harassment, as well as charges of the violation of my civil liberties. I figure by the time I’m done, I’ll all but own this town, so I can easily pay for the damages done at the gas station.” She slid the officer a narrow smile. “What was the fine levied on that town the last time a cop failed to read a person their rights, Agent? Up in Marietta, remember that?”

  Taige blinked, her lashes drooping low over her eyes. “I think it was something to the tune of over a million. So far, you’ve been denied a phone call, you’ve yet to be told just why you’re being held. Plus, there are two of you. Wow.” She cocked her head and looked over at Jay. “Just why are you here?”

  “Some fine, upstanding citizen decided to put his hands on me. I defended myself and his leg was broken in the altercation. I’m the one who got hauled to jail. Not him, even though he is the one who started the whole fucking mess.”

  Taige had pale gray eyes. Against the soft brown of her skin, they glittered like winter ice and she turned her head, stared at the cop. A muscle pulsed in his jaw and he slowly started to wither under that stare. “Do you understand how serious an offense it is to detain a woman over a matter like this? She defended herself and instead of dealing with the actual perpetrator, you violated her rights.” She gave Jay a serene smile. “It looks like you and I are going to hang around town for a while, Jay. We’ll need to contact a lawyer and see about getting all this straightened out.”

  A new voice cut through the hall. “What in the fuck is going on here?”

  It was, Linc decided, kind of sweet, watching as hell froze over.

  That was what was happening too.

  It hadn’t even been six weeks since he’d turned in his badge and that pissant had told him that if he hadn’t let his bastard girl run wild, maybe she wouldn’t be missing. A bad girl will come to a bad end, Steve Mays had told him when he’d tried to push the cops to investigate. He had been doing his own investigation, but there was only so much a man could do when every fucking door shut in his face.

  When the town’s cops were practically laughing at you.

  Linc had stood face to face with that man, the chief of police, a man who’d let his own son run wild, who’d golfed with the judges and talked his way out of all the tickets Linc had written for that boy. When his son had assaulted not one, but three high school girls, Mays had swept it all under the rug. Except one of the assault cases had happened outside city limits and when that happened, it fell into Linc’s lap and the small city’s police force couldn’t do shit about it.

  He’d investigated, he’d worked with the county DA to build a case.

  Then the girl’s family came and told him she was leaving the state. She didn’t want to prosecute. She was going to school up in New York and her life would be better if she could just let this go.

  They didn’t even try to lie when he found out about the check that had been written to them.

  Mays had bought their silence.

  The day Linc had turned in his badge, he’d told Mays he’d find answers.

  Mays had laughed at him. If you’d kept that little tramp under control, there wouldn’t be a problem.

  He’d hit him and the days Linc had spent in jail had only hardened his resolve.

  There would be hell to pay.

  Sooner or later, he’d find answers.

  And he’d see Mays suffer.

  Maybe this wasn’t quite what he had in mind.

  But as Mays looked from the FBI agent to Jay to Linc, Linc could almost see the fine little lines of strain fanning out from his eyes.

  It’s the beginning of the end for you, old man.

  It wasn’t a cold day here in Hell, but good ol’ Steve was about to be brought down. He just didn’t know it yet.

  Jay… He ran his tongue across his teeth, trying to process what he was hearing. Jay had ties to the FBI. Jay. His girlfriend. Well, not exactly. Less than a week after his baby disappeared, he’d cut ties with her. He didn’t have room for her in his life. Room for anything or anybody.

  But there had been a connection, yes. All online. They’d Skyped. Emailed. Texted. Plus, well, yeah, he had to be honest. Texting had led to some hot and heavy sexting that had him under a cold shower far more often than he cared to admit.

  But they’d never met. He’d looked into her background. He was a cop—or had been. Of course he’d checked her out. Nothing had seemed out of place, so if she wasn’t a security specialist, whoever had built that fake background of hers had done a fucking-A job of it.

  None of that changed the fact that she had ties to the FBI.

  Taige Morgan.

  She was the woo-woo nutbag almost every person affiliated with law enforcement in this part of the country knew about. Some people revered her. Others ste
ered clear. Linc would just as soon not have anything to do with her. He didn’t know how she helped close so many cases but the psychic line was bullshit.

  Now she was talking to Jay in a low, steady voice.

  Jay had her arms hanging through the bars, a sneer in her voice as she answered.

  “Do you all have dicks shoved in your ears or what?” Mays demanded, his eyes burning a hole in Jay’s skull. “I just asked what in the fuck is going on here and I want an answer.”

  A slow smile came across Taige’s face as she turned to face him.

  “I’d kind of like to know the answer to that myself. I take it you’re Chief Mays?”

  Mays blinked, staring at her with dumb stupefaction rolling across his face. Then his expression went carefully blank.

  Linc could have laughed. Mays must have recognized her too.

  Yeah, son. You just realized you and your boys have a fuckload of problems here, didn’t you?

  Taige glanced Linc’s way, oh so briefly, and if he wasn’t mistaken, her mouth twitched in a smile. Then she looked back at Chief Mays. She didn’t offer her hand. Instead she flashed him her ID. “Taige Morgan, FBI.”

  “I know who you are, Agent Morgan.” He ran his thumb down his jaw and then flicked a look back into the cell. “Dawson, are you so desperate now that you’re hiring a psychic?”

  He saw Jay’s shoulders tighten.

  Closing his eyes, he braced himself for the questions. But she never turned to look at him.

  Taige was the one who spoke up.

  “Chief Mays.” She gave him a sharp-edged smile. “I wasn’t hired by anybody. I was just going to make a quick in and out, see what the hold-up was—Roberts was expected to check in recently and she didn’t. Now I understand why. Is there a reason she wasn’t given a phone call?”

  Mays rocked back on his heels, his eyes narrowing. “Just why was Roberts in my town to begin with?”

  “Hardly your concern. You’ll be apprised if need be.” Taige smiled. “This town is still part of the U.S., right?”

  “Beg your pardon?”

  “I think it is. I’m just trying to understand why your officer decided it was okay to run roughshod over their civil rights. No phone call. They weren’t Mirandized. They don’t even know why they are in jail.” She gave him a wide, brilliant smile. “Not to mention the fact that Ms. Roberts was being hassled by three men—that’s what set this whole incident off. She defended herself and instead of your officer addressing that fact, he went after her. So, is Hell a part of the United States, or not?”

  Chief Mays stared at her, his expression stony. Then he looked over at his officer, who had been sullen and silent throughout the entire exchange. “I’m quite certain my officer would have read the prisoner her rights, Agent Morgan.”

  “Hmmm. And the phone call?” This time, her smile wasn’t so brilliant. It was hard-edged, like broken glass under the winter sun. “We can always check on that.”

  He stared at her. After fifteen seconds, she pulled out her phone, hit a number.

  “This is Agent Morgan. I need to speak to SAC Taylor Jones.” She paused for a beat of two. “Jones, it’s Morgan. Yes, it most definitely is about that situation in Hell, Georgia. I’ll be detained. It might even be worth one of us poking around down here and seeing just what in the hell is going on. When do I need him? Well, yesterday…yeah. Roberts didn’t get a phone call, there’s some question as to whether she was read her rights and it sounds like the situation is the same with the other prisoner…”

  She paused and smiled at the chief while he started to sputter. “I’ll be with you in a moment, Chief.”

  “Sorry, sir,” she said, turning her attention back to the phone call. “No, I’ll still be able to continue looking for that information. I’m not sure just what the problem is here, but I’ll stay in touch.”

  She was quiet a second. Then she nodded. “Hold on…” She focused her eyes on the sheriff. “Yes, sir… His name? The chief? Chief Mays, I didn’t catch the first name.”

  Inside the cell, Linc closed his eyes and bit the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling as Steve Mays started to slowly steam. His eyes all but drilled holes in Taige and she blithely smiled back at him.

  No matter how in the hell the rest of his life turned out, Linc was going to remember that moment. The moment fear bled into that cowardly, egotistical, evil son-of-a-bitch’s eyes.

  A moment later Taige disconnected the call and gave Mays another one of those winning smiles. “My boss might be coming down for a quick visit,” she said. “Roberts. You can touch base with him then.”

  “Just what is the fucking problem here?” Mays snarled.

  “Oh, civil rights violations for one…that’s not the sort of thing he would take a look at. He handles other matters…normally.” She gave the sheriff a bright smile. “But you can imagine he’s going to be concerned with something that involves his people.”

  She turned to Jay and crossed her arms. “I’m not sure how long it will take me to get you out. Are you going to be okay?”

  It took Taige less than one hundred and twenty seconds to get Jay released from the cell after that point.

  Not only did the oh-so-stupid Officer Biff Stahley release her from the cell, he also opened the door to Linc’s as well, after Mays jerked his chin toward it and snarled, “Him too.”

  “But—”

  “I am not dealing with a bunch of uppity, bleeding heart civil rights assholes all because you’re too fucking stupid to read them their rights,” Mays bit off as he turned on his heel and stormed to the front of the station.

  Linc shoved off the wall and sauntered out, patted Biff on the shoulder. “One of these days, you might almost pass for a rent-a-cop, kid. It will be okay.”

  Biff shoved him.

  “Careful there,” Taige said, her voice mocking. “I’d hate to have to testify that you laid your hands on a prisoner… No, wait. I wouldn’t.”

  “Fucking cunt,” Biff muttered under his breath. Then he jerked a thumb to the door. “Get the hell out of here so we can finish the paperwork up. I got shit to do.” He went to catch Jay’s arm but she sidled out of his reach, aligning herself with Taige.

  Linc looked over at Jay, watched as Taige put herself between them. “I think we can trust her to behave herself,” Taige said levelly. “If you need to manhandle anybody, you can always escort the male prisoner.”

  A muscle pulsed in Biff’s cheek but he spun on his heel and stormed out, leaving them to follow.

  Taige’s brows arched over her eyes. “Wow.”

  Linc thought about mentioning that this wasn’t even the tip of the iceberg. But he didn’t see the point.

  Mays wanted to gut that bitch.

  The problem was it just wasn’t an option. If she had just been some stupid piece of colored trash driving through his town, he could have dealt with her and nobody would have been the wiser.

  The problem was that FBI attached to her name.

  As he led her, the pink- and blue-haired punk bitch and Dawson out into the bullpen, he had to realign his thoughts and accept the facts.

  The last thing he needed was to have the FBI messing around with his town. This was his town. Once that no-good, piece-of-shit Dawson had resigned himself to that fact and stepped aside, Mays had taken over and that was how things were. His town. He was in charge, ran it his way.

  Maybe the Dawson family had more money than the Mays family did, but that didn’t mean shit. They had it because the fuckers had some high and mighty bastards who invented some gadgets, held a few patents. They thought that made them special.

  The Mays family had been the real power in this town for a long time, and now he was finally doing just what they were meant to do.

  Running things.

  His father had been the sheriff until he died of a heart attack. Things had been just fine until then. The man who’d stepped into his shoes had been some dumbass who had wanted to modernize things and, fo
r fuck’s sake, there had been a female cop. The chief then had been too fucking soft and then Dawson had come home from college with his fancy-ass degree in law enforcement. People on the town council had liked him, his parents. Too many soft-ass idiots who didn’t know dick about running a town.

  An accident had left the one full-time officer in a wheelchair and Dawson had applied. He’d eventually taken over when the sheriff retired and people talked out their asses about what a good job he’d done during his time here. Fuck. A good job? He’d arrested Steve’s boy over bullshit charges. Sexual assault—a girl goes out dressed like a whore, she’ll get treated like one. The charges went nowhere, Steve had seen to that.

  And he’d waited. Waited for his chance, but it had been a long time coming.

  Dawson didn’t seem to do shit wrong. Kept his business in order, paid his taxes on time. Probably even washed his hands after he jacked off. If he knew how to jack off, that is.

  But he’d landed his ass in Steve’s jail a time or two.

  Make that three.

  Steve might have laughed about it, except somehow this last time had come with an FBI agent.

  Or two.

  The bitch with the pink-and-blue hair was staring at him.

  Her eyes, green as grass, all but glowed as their gazes connected, and his head went a little light. Images flashed through his mind and he slammed a hand against the counter to catch his balance. A cool hand brushed against his.

  The girl…what was her name?

  DeeDee. Missing.

  How long now?

  His thoughts got muddled and the air around him felt hotter. Tighter. He struggled to breathe and reached up, jerking at the collar of his shirt.

  A hand touched her shoulder.

  Jay brushed it off and deepened the connection.

  Abruptly, she found herself spun around, staring up at Taige.

  “Enough.”

  The voice in her mind was clear as a bell and Jay fought the urge to scream at her.

  “You don’t know. You didn’t see—”

  “I did,” Taige countered, her voice cool. “I saw.”