Jac looked up when he entered the rec room again. He’d lost the apron. His deep-brown hair was sticking out everywhere on his head—it was definitely time for a haircut. There was a shell-shocked, exhausted expression in his gorgeous blue eyes. Even his broad shoulders drooped from exhaustion, making her want to cuddle the man.
Jac watched him for a moment. Max liked order.
A kids’ birthday party was as disorderly as it could get.
Emery had had a wonderful day. That was what mattered.
She moved a chair off to the side. A stuffed animal fell to the floor.
Jac scooped it up.
It was Rachel’s daughter’s. “Do you want to send this to the school with Emery on Monday? It’s the little Sturvin girl’s. His name is Mr. Bird, and he’s very special.”
Max nodded. “I found a few other things. I’m sure that’s Bobby Dennis’s coat. Under all that icing. Or Matthew Hellbrook’s. I’ll probably have a box to carry in when I drop her off for those kids who don’t have PAVAD parents.”
“You survived another year. I’m proud of you.”
“It was horrendous. When do they outgrow birthday parties like this?” he asked in a whisper.
Jac looked at the little girl rocking out to her new iPod, with the doll cuddled close. Such a mix of growing up and little child all rolled into one. “Too soon?”
His gaze followed hers. The love he had for his daughter was written right there for her to see. She loved Max the Dad. He was just so good at it.
“Yeah. Too soon. I remember my mother baking her a little cake for her first birthday. Now…”
Max stepped closer as Jac stretched up to grab a taunting pink balloon just over her own head.
His hands went around her waist, and he lifted.
Right where her shirt had risen.
His hands scorched her skin. She grabbed the balloon—and an undignified squeak escaped.
He lowered her to the ground.
Jac’s front pressed to his. “Maddox James, what do you think you’re doing?”
It came out in a breathless whisper.
“We’re not at PAVAD right now. I…like the new shirt.” His fingers tightened. Max had perfect hands. Big, strong, hot. “It looks…soft. Beautiful. You should always wear this color.”
Jac looked up at him. Ten inches separated them in height. One hundred and fifty pounds. He made her feel feminine and breathless right then. Sexy, desirable, feminine. In that moment.
Like he hadn’t before.
Even during the Kiss-That-Shouldn’t-Have-Been.
They weren’t arguing now. They weren’t in the heat of the moment.
“Max? I thought we said we weren’t going to do this?” There was a look in his eyes now. One that told her Max liked knowing he had her so confused. The jerk—he liked disconcerting her.
Playing with her. Hunting her like the prey she most certainly felt like. Jac shivered.
It had been a while since a man had made her feel like this.
She fought the urge to close her eyes and just breathe the scent of man and birthday cake in.
He was enjoying himself. Her front tingled where it was pressed against his absolutely perfect chest. Max felt hard and strong against her. He had a six-pack under that sweatshirt—she’d seen that before.
Jac didn’t know what to do with her hands. Somehow, her arms slipped around his waist. Then they were pressed almost as close as they could be with clothes on—and a nine-year-old in the room with them.
She sent a look across the room. Emery had her eyes closed and was doing a kid version of head banging to the music. “I think…we’d probably better back away here. Before we do something else we’ll regret. Something I don’t think you’re ready to talk to your daughter about just yet.”
“I’ll never regret this.” Max’s mouth covered hers. It was enough to tilt her entire world sideways.
Heaven help her, Jac kissed him back instinctively. Before she could stop herself. Or think about the possible repercussions.
She kissed him back right there with Emery fifteen feet away. Until someone knocked on the door that led to the driveway from the garage.
She pulled away.
Her eyes met his.
“You…you and I…we’re going to talk. One way or the other, Jaclyn. You can count on that.”
Someone knocked again. The shadow at the window shifted.
Jac stepped back.
Paul Sturvin was peering into the window.
No doubt, he’d come to retrieve his daughter’s stuffed animal.
Jac didn’t care. She scurried to the bathroom, leaving Max to deal with the man at the door.
Leave it to Max—just when Jac thought she’d figured things out, the man did what he could to shake things up completely.
Jac brushed one finger over her lips. She could still taste him. Could still feel him pressed against her. The man just kept changing everything, just when she least expected it.
28
Anger. Paul had always known he had a problem with anger. Most of the time, he was able to control that. Even for years. But it built. Inside him, so strongly that he sometimes couldn’t keep it in.
That’s when impulsive, stupid things happened. Things he’d always regret.
He hadn’t meant for this to happen. He had meant to wait until he had the money, they were established in their new lifestyle, and the girls were doing well, and then he was going to quietly discuss his plans for their separation.
Meeting Jaclyn Jones and feeling the passion that she brought in him had made it clear that he was only harming himself by being tied down to Rachel.
There was another, better woman for him out there. A better mother for the girls. One who wasn’t so weak all the time.
He hadn’t wanted to repeat past mistakes. Not like he had before.
He had intended to make Rachel understand that he would be the best choice to raise the girls, with generous visitation rights, of course. And then they were going to separate, go their own ways.
Leaving him free to build a relationship with someone else.
He had even considered Jaclyn as a perfect replacement for Rachel. She was cultured, wealthy, beautiful, and the girls already thought well of her. It had made the most sense. He had discounted Max Jones, at first.
He had revised that idea after the party, after what he had seen.
Liars. Jones had lied to Paul, making him think that Jaclyn was free. All the while she had been with Emery’s father.
Most likely, it was to protect their reputations at the bureau. He wasn’t clear on PAVAD regulations, but fraternization was generally frowned upon, or so he assumed.
Unless one was the director of PAVAD and the head of forensics, that was. Or that director’s daughter and the head of the CCU. Or a CCU team leader and the top medical examiner in the country. Paul had a list he’d created somewhere in a spreadsheet.
Being special people evoked special privileges.
Nothing he had found on Jaclyn told him that she had broken the rules. If anything, she was extremely adherent.
Red was everywhere.
Paul couldn’t stay there. He had to make this look like an accident.
Then he would find his daughters. They would move on.
Build the life he wanted.
With Jaclyn, perhaps. She was rather perfect.
Except for her relationship with Max Jones.
Rachel was out of the way now. He had to figure this out.
Nothing else he could do. He had to move forward. Otherwise, everything he had worked for would be destroyed.
Again.
He had their savings, he had the money he had been given for his information. He would be ok. He would find the girls and start over.
They would all be ok.
He would figure out what to do about Jaclyn later.
Right now, he had to focus on his daughters.
And the woman who had taken them away fr
om him.
29
Ed answered the cell phone on his side of the bed before it could wake his wife or the child snuggled in the bed between them. From the size, he suspected it was one of four little boys. They had nine-year-old twins, then another boy a year younger. Ed’s grandson Matthew was the same age as his youngest son and was in his own bed down the hall.
The hair was too dark to be Matthew, though. So either James, Timothy, or Bobby.
One benefit of having a large house was plenty of bedrooms for his children and grandchildren. That didn’t help when it was storming and the kids got frightened. Usually, that was when Ed ended up on the couch, leaving Marianna with the little kickers.
For a while there, it had just been Ed, his daughter, and his grandson. Over the last few years, their family had grown.
Ed had one daughter in her early thirties—Matthew’s mother—and his wife had brought with her to their marriage seven wonderful boys whom Ed had adopted over eighteen months earlier.
In that time, Georgia had given him one beautiful granddaughter, who was now two years old, and was midway through another pregnancy.
His family.
He loved them fiercely.
He’d kill to protect them, each and every one of them—even his son-in-law, massive irritant though Hellbrook was.
When the director of the FBI received a phone call at six a.m. on his day off, it was never going to be a good thing.
It meant someone he knew was in serious trouble.
He took responsibility for the four hundred and eighty-seven members of PAVAD—from the newest intern and mail clerk, all the way through his assistant director, Fin McLaughlin.
His instincts were flaring. Telling him that something was going on. He listened quickly to the voice on the other line.
When he heard the name, he flinched.
He’d met the family before. What was going to happen now would never be easy. But it had to be done. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
By the time he disconnected, Marianna was waking, snuggling their son close. The kid in their bed was his youngest. Bobby was plagued by nightmares and still looked for his parents at night, especially when it stormed.
His thoughts landed on another child, a year or so younger than his son. Fear for that child, one he had met on a few occasions, had him making a quick decision. If it was Bobby or one of the other kids he loved, Ed would want the best there to help find him.
It was his day off, but there would be time to relax when this was over.
The little girl’s face flashed into his mind. She was just a baby. This…she didn’t deserve this.
“Mari...” He leaned over and kissed her quickly. No matter what Ed had going on with the bureau, he would always stop and show her how much he loved her. Show her how blessed he was to have her in his life.
Because he knew just how blessed he was.
“What is it?”
“There’s been a murder.” He explained the details quickly, quietly, mindful of the still-sleeping boy in the bed behind them. Marianna would have to get the kids up and moving in the next half hour, to get them to school on time. Then... “I’m going in. I’ll text you the address when I get there.”
“I’ll call in my team. As soon as I drop the boys off, I’ll join you there.” She slipped skinny arms around him. “We’ll manage this, Ed. I promise.”
He just buried his hands in her rich, dark hair and held her for as long as he possibly could. And he wondered.
Just what had happened out there last night to cause this.
30
It was the photographs that caught Jac’s attention first. Always.
No matter what crime scene she worked, it was the photographs of the victims that she studied first.
Photographs were windows into the victims’ souls, after all.
Her eyes focused on the victim’s face first, in the wedding photo that took center stage on the wall, as grief threatened to freeze her where she stood.
She had seemed content in her marriage, thrilled with her children. She didn’t work outside the home, but she’d mentioned volunteer work through a church and at the school to Jac a few times before. And flowers.
Rachel had loved flowers. She spoke so animatedly about mums and tulips and gladiolas. Her passion. A passion Rachel and Jac had shared.
It was Rachel.
Jac shouldn’t have been called to this scene.
The local police officer who had let her in had checked her creds and told her to step inside after she put on the familiar paper booties and gloves.
He’d told her the director of PAVAD was waiting for her.
Inside.
She’d already found Ed Dennis and spoken with him.
Jac’s name and address had been stuck to a post note prominently displayed on the refrigerator.
Director Dennis had wanted to know why.
He wanted to know what she knew about the family. Wanted to know how she was connected to Paul and Rachel Sturvin. If she knew anything of them outside of Brynlock.
She would.
Before the next day was over, she would know everything about them that she could.
Her first stop was the hallway.
Rachel had fallen in the hallway.
Rachel’s hand was stretched out in front of her. Like she was reaching.
Toward her daughters’ rooms.
Or for help. Jac’s throat threatened to close as she imagined the last thoughts Rachel might have had.
For her daughters. It would have been for her daughters. Just as Jac’s would have been for Emery, Max, Nat, and Miranda.
The ones she loved.
Jac crossed her arms over her chest to make herself as small as possible as she walked carefully around the area the forensics teams had sectioned off. Hugged the walls. There was a twelve-inch-wide path around the woman’s body.
Around…Rachel.
Rachel Sturvin lay dead in her recently recarpeted hallway floor.
Jac had seen more bodies than she wanted to count, but this...
This was different.
This was her friend right there.
She stepped into the first bedroom just to get away from the sight of Rachel’s body as the ME’s assistant Jayne covered Rachel’s face respectfully.
Jayne and Tony would be moving Rachel soon.
To the morgue. To Jules Brockman and Mia Stephenson and Gia and the rest.
There was only one place Rachel was going now.
Jac pulled in a deep breath. She ignored the copper scent of blood surrounding her.
She had to focus. Had other things to think about.
Jac heard the sounds of a gurney being carried up the stairs of Rachel’s home.
She closed her eyes and pushed her personal feelings away.
She opened her eyes. Jac had work to do now.
Ava. Ava had just turned four. It was her room Jac suspected she was in now. The toys were all dog themed. Stuffed animals littered the place, but they were neat. Arranged on shelves and above the bed. There were no toys out of place, not like Emery’s room where everything was always strewn everywhere. Emery was always in too much of a hurry to put her toys away.
The first thing Ava had asked Jac had been if Jac had a dog. Ava wanted her own dog more than anything else in the world, but her father said no. She loved the neighbor’s little dog. Ava had told her all about Sadie, the mutt.
Perhaps Rachel had straightened the room as she’d tucked Ava in the night before. Jac stepped closer. Tried to look objectively.
The bed didn’t look slept in.
Rachel had been dead since about midnight.
Where had Ava slept?
Jac stepped back out into the hall as they were lifting Rachel onto the gurney. Blond hair was just visible at the top of the body bag. Tony finished zipping her in, as Jayne started fastening the straps.
Jac had seen similar sights before. None…none had hurt like this. Jac st
ruggled to breathe for a moment as she watched the body of her friend being wheeled away. She had to control herself, or she’d be off this case before she could blink.
She hadn’t known Rachel that well. She’d have to keep reminding herself of that if necessary. The only thing she could do for Rachel now was find the person who had killed her.
Olivia, the seven-year-old, had the room across the hall from her sister.
The parents’ bedroom was at the opposite end of the hall.
It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that the girls had slept in Olivia’s room—or their parents’.
Little ones of that age bracket often had nightmares. They went looking for the people that loved them, to reassure themselves that they were safe.
Emery did. The times she’d spent the night with Jac, there had been a nightmare or two.
Olivia and Ava probably had nightmares, too.
Olivia’s room reminded her of Emery’s. The walls were painted a similar shade of pink.
Jac had helped Emery and Max pick it out and paint Emery’s room two years ago, erasing the sweet baby yellow that Max’s mother and sister had painted it six years before when Max and Emery had first moved to St. Louis.
Emery had been thrilled with her big-girl room. Now, there were USA softball team players on Emery’s walls and American Girl posters. And paintings Emery had done that Jac thought were good for her age.
There were no such decorations on Olivia’s walls. The artwork was tasteful and sedate.
It didn’t shout little girl to Jac at all.
There was a familiar character printed all over Olivia’s pillow. The bedspread was of the highest quality. Very feminine.
Emery would sneer at something that girly in her room.
Olivia’s room was as immaculate as her younger sister’s. Just as showroom decorated.
That stood out.
The entire house was in perfect condition. Nothing seemed out of place, which was odd in a house with children.
The only thing out of place had been Rachel.
And the blood.
Nausea threatened; Jac pushed it away.
Olivia’s math book was spread out over the small white desk in the corner. Jac looked at it for a moment. She’d helped Emery with problems out of that same math book a year ago. Jac used a pencil to open the book to the front cover, to the names of the previous students. Just to see. Just to not see Emery’s name written there.
Searching (PAVAD- FBI Romantic Suspense Book 18) Page 11
