Praise for the Dead Roses series:
"I'd give this book ten stars if Amazon had them, it was really that good." by The Books Debut
"This book will keep you reading with a very unexpected twist..." by Cyruss1264
"It's strange, mysterious, and down right cool! It made me wonder if this really happened." by Jek Jamison
"A suspense/thriller where nothing is as it seems." by Heartsong Reviews
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
The red and blue lights on several police cars twirled, lighting the early morning sky with an unnatural glow. It was four a.m. Detective Fuller and I were at the scene of a 187. Homicide. I hated those calls. The other members of our team said it was because I was a baby. I was younger than them. Only nineteen. But I got the feeling no one liked the dispatches where death was involved. They just tried to play tough to make me look bad.
I’d been detective for six months, which was unprecedented, but I was one of those special people. That’s what the doctor’s said. “Rose is a unique little girl.” “The pictures Rose says she sees in her mind are a manifestation of her need for attention.” “Rose is peculiar.” And on and on.
I finished high school at fourteen, and graduated summa cum laude from Harvard at eighteen. Beyond the smarts though was my ability to read a person’s intentions with a single touch.
I wasn’t psychic. I couldn’t talk to ghosts, or summon the dead. When I touched someone’s hands I got a glimpse of their intentions.
Only two people knew that secret: My partner, and ex-boyfriend, Jack. And, the man who murdered my parents.
I always wanted to be a cop. The FBI and the CIA both approached me to join their ranks. I declined. Maybe someday. For now, though, I liked being a detective in small Blush Valley, California. Population 1,906. It kept me plenty busy.
“She’s young. Maybe eighteen. Nineteen,” Jack observed, bringing me out of my reverie.
I squatted next to him, making sure I kept my loafers out of the blood that pooled under the dead girl. With the tip of my pen, I moved a piece of her blond hair from her glitter-adorned eyes. They were blue. An all American-looking girl. I jotted the information on my notepad.
“Probably had big dreams of becoming a movie star.” I sighed, watching my breath cloud in front of me like cigar smoke. It was unseasonably cold for this part of California.
Our town was thirty-six miles east of Los Angeles. We saw a lot of traffic pass through. Young, beautiful girls. Pretty boys. All of them wide-eyed and full of hope. For most, that hope didn’t last long. Jack always joked that Blush Valley was the town where dreams went to die.
I disagreed. For the most part, I liked Blush Valley. The town had everything. Four seasons. Well, three and a little. We rarely saw Snow. Trees. Several parks for the kids, including a newly finished skate park. Sand dunes. Restaurants. A shopping center. Grocery stores. A movie theater. Even a nice-sized lake, which the locals called Hangover Beach.
Of course Blush Valley was also home to four strip clubs, and eight bars. The source of ninety percent of the town’s revenue, and the reason our streets looked tidy and were lined with beautiful flowerbeds. It wasn’t too big or too small. All the locals knew each other. If someone new moved in, by the end of the day everyone knew it.
At the moment Jack and I were in an alley behind one of the seedier clubs—BendOver’s. The club had been busted more than once for selling more than just eye candy. He prostituted out the girls from his club for a phenomenal fee. The club stayed opened though. The owner, Walter, was charged hefty fines once in a while, and that was the end of it. Rumors swirled the Judge, and the City Council members were in his back pocket. It was probably true.
“It seems Walter has been recruiting new meat,” Jack said, pulling on a pair of rubber gloves.
Jack was hot. He exuded magnetism, was cocky as all get out, and possessed the brilliance to back it up. The epitome of a tall, brooding man begging for the right woman to fix him. I’d fallen for it, big time. Jack acted jaded, but underneath that façade was a kinder, gentler man. He’d shown me that side of him occasionally, which was why we dated. But not often enough. I still cared for him. He made a great partner, but as a couple we didn’t work. I wanted someone who was man enough to show his softer side on a regular basis. Not just when he had a few drinks under his belt.
“Don’t call her that. She isn’t a piece of meat. And how can you be sure she was one of Walter’s girl’s?” She most likely was. The six-inch heels, and two-inch thick makeup were usually a giveaway. Lately though, it seemed even regular girls dressed like that. So it was hard to be sure. What got under my skin was that Jack knew the victim was new. Did Jack frequent this sort of place?
He gave me a cursory glance. “Shall I go into detail? Explain again about the different shades of bruising between her thighs, her lack of underwear, or the—”
“Yeah, I get it.” Using the pen, I lifted her red scarf-shaped tube top. There was more bruising but they were fading. Certainly not the cause of death. “I don’t see any bullet holes, or knife wounds, but look at her wrists.” They were raw and bloody.
“Looks like she was bound with zip ties.” A frown crossed Jack’s face.
I put on my own pair of rubber gloves, and touched her dry, cracked lips. “Residue. He duct taped her mouth.” I shook my head, and felt around on the girl’s head. “No bumps, or lacerations.” A wisp of anxiety swirled in my stomach. Last week a girl was murdered and found in the alley behind Shenanigans, another one of Walter’s clubs. The victim had blond hair, blue eyes, and… “Does she have implants?” I asked, but checked the dead girl’s breasts myself. It was easy enough.
“Now isn’t the time to turn me on, Hansen,” Jack teased.
“Not funny, Jack,” I said darkly. “Can you help me get her on her side?” If I were right, there would be a knife wound in the center of her back about four inches in length. It would’ve punctured her heart and killed her instantly.
“Are you thinking what I think your thinking?” He got on the other side and grasped the girl’s left hip, rolling her.
Chapter 2
I didn’t bother to respond. He was being Mr. Jack. Templeton. Ass. And I didn’t have the patience for it. My stomach roiled at all the blood. But I’d called it. In the exact spot where the other girl was stabbed, this girl had the same wound. From its size, I guessed the killer probably used the same knife. “We might have a serial killer on our hands.” Several of the other detectives overheard and came over.
“Why do you say that, Rosy?”
I didn’t bother to look at Bevan Poserman or Poser as I liked to call him. Instead I pointed at the knife wound. “This laceration is exactly the same size, and is in the exact spot as the wound we found on the girl last week.” I stood, and turned, facing the other detectives. There were four, three men and one woman, though Nancy Baldwin dressed and behaved with more masculinity than most. Steeling myself, I said, “Both girls are about the same height, have the same hair color, eye color, and both have implants.”
A couple of the other detectives snickered.
“What? It’s true.” I forced down my tendency to lose my temper when I couldn’t control a situation.
Jack, ever my protector, came to stand beside me.
“Tell them Jack,” I said, trying not to sound juvenile.
He cleared his throat. “I thi
nk what Poser and these other yahoo’s may be getting at is that in this victims particular line of work—stripper and probably hooker—”
“Seriously,” I interrupted, crossing my arms in frustration. Was it every guy’s fantasy to think a stripper would sleep with him?
Stop being a bitch, I scolded myself, and sighed.
Jack raised a perfectly arched brow, and continued, “There are a lot of blond, blue-eyed girls with implants who work as strippers.”
“It’s like a prerequisite,” Nancy added, snorting.
I glared, clenching my hands into fists. “But what about the knife wound. It’s a perfect match.”
“We won’t know that for sure until we hear back from forensics, and the coroner gives us cause of death,” Jack said.
“Fine. But you’ll see I’m right.” I snapped off my gloves and tossed them into the trash, heading toward our vehicle. My part of the investigation on the scene was done. I needed some sleep before I said something I’d regret later.
The other members of my team just didn’t get it. They didn’t get me, or understand. I’d made it my business to collect data on homicide victims. Since the day of my parent’s murder, I thought of little else. Except maybe the man who killed them. The other detectives wouldn’t know that. No one did, except Jack, and our Commander.
Someone grabbed my hand. “Hey, don’t get your panties in a bunch. We’ll know soon enough. If you’re right I’ll let you take me to dinner.” He puckered his lips, and and winked.
I froze. No one touched me. It was an unspoken rule. I didn’t shake hands, unless I wore gloves, and I certainly didn’t hold someone’s hand. It was one of my quirks.
Poser didn’t seem to care. Images of porn, sex with an unknown stranger, and him doing things to me flashed across my mind—his intentions.
I yanked my hand away. “Touch me again and I’ll break your fingers,” I hissed.
Poser scowled, and in a voice so low only I could hear, he said, “You think you’re tough, but you better watch yourself or you might end up getting hurt.”
Jack pushed between us. “Back up, Poser.” Jack grabbed my arm and moved me away. “You alright?”
I took a deep breath. “Yeah, but I feel sorry for whichever girl Poser hooks up with tonight.” I didn’t explain why. But, ugh. I wanted to gag.
Chapter 3
“Gather round people,” Deputy Chief Collins hollered. He was short, shorter than my five foot four inches, with curly brown hair. A total health nut with biceps the size of his head, and short-guy syndrome the size of my home state of Utah.
I closed the file I worked on, grabbed my cup of herbal tea, and walked over. The “war room” was shaped in a rectangle. On one end were the desks, and on the other was a podium, a gigantic white board with photos of the victim, Walter (the strip club owner), and the guy who phoned in the murder. Folding chairs sat in a semi-circle in front of the white board, empty. Along the walls fake green garland sprayed with fake white snow was strung. At certain points on the garland, a pinecone and red berry wreath hung. A fake tree decorated with lame Christmas ornaments sat sadly in the corner near the white board. The gold star on top leaned heavily to the right, but I barely noticed. The decorations had been up since the day after Thanksgiving.
Jack was seated on the edge of his desk texting. I took the folding chair in front of him. Poser, Ramsey, and Smith were lounging at Poser’s desk, discussing “hot bitches,” sexual positions, and other inappropriate topics for the workplace and in general. I wished a selective mute button existed, one that worked on people. Those three would be on perma-mute. Nancy, Ramsey’s partner, was on the phone at her desk.
Diving right in, the Chief said, “We’ll start with this morning’s murder. What do we know about our victim?”
Ramsey, the pudgy father of four girls, answered, “Her stage name was Lola. Her real name is Leslie Williams. She was eighteen and from Afton, Wyoming. We’ve contacted her parents. They are on their way.”
The Chief nodded. “Good. I want to talk to them when they arrive.” He rubbed a hand over his brown curls. “What else?”
Nancy hung up her phone, and said, “Leslie started working as a stripper two weeks ago. We’ve talked to a couple of the girls who worked last night. They said Lola was on the early shift, and that a guy they didn’t recognize seemed to pay particular attention to her. They weren’t sure if he and Lola left together. But they described him as slightly overweight ”
“What about the 911 caller?” The Chief strode over to the white board and pointed at the guy’s picture.
Poser answered. “Arnold Neville, a BendOver’s regular. Said he and one of the girls went into the alley for some private time and that’s when they saw the girl lying on the ground near a dumpster where we found her.”
“What about the girl he was with?”
I half listened to the interchange between Poser and the Chief. The reason, embarrassingly enough, was a gorgeous man in a navy pinstripe suit, white shirt, and red tie dotted with tiny green Christmas trees entered the room. Surprised, I checked the calendar on my cell phone. It was December 24th—Christmas Eve.
Whoa! Thanks for reminding me I have no one to spend the holiday with, I thought somewhat darkly.
It wasn’t anything new. I had a date—with my DVD player, and a bowl of popcorn mixed with melted Junior Mints.
My body flushed at the sight of the guy. He moved with an easy confidence. Tall, with long, muscled legs. Blond hair, cut above the ears, like he was military. Thick biceps pulled at the sleeves of his suit, and his pants were belted low on his hips.
Normally, I was pretty nonchalant and casual about men, especially since my partner saw fit to enlighten me on their oddities. “Insider guy material,” was what Jack called his daily onslaught of information.
Down girl, I reprimanded.
Jack must’ve noticed my movements because he leaned over and whispered, “Easy, cowgirl.”
I sniffed. Whatever. He has no room to give me crap, I thought crossing my legs. The effort caused the cheap folding chair to squeak.
At the noise, and to my mortification, the man turned my direction, his features all business. My breath hitched. He has caramel colored eyes, I thought internally fanning myself. If I could have punched myself for my reaction, I would have. I wasn’t a twittering little teenager.
Interrupting my reverie, Chief Collins introduced him. “This is Vincent Mackey. He’s our FBI liaison, and will be taking the lead on this case.
Chapter 4
“Wait. What? That’s mine and Jack’s case,” I sat forward, spilling some of the hot tea on my jeans, which caused me to holler in pain.
The rest of the team started laughing. Vincent covered a laugh with a cough, and pulled a white handkerchief from his pocket. Sauntering over, he held it out.
“Here,” he said kindly, his eyes twinkling.
“What? Are you fifty?” I took it though. It felt soft, expensive. I pressed it against my pants, dabbing at the wet spot. My thigh felt like it was on fire.
Vincent bent so we were level and said, “I’m twenty-nine, but close.” Then he winked, and strode back to Chief Collins. I stared after him, speechless.
The Chief glowered. “You and Jack will be working with Agent Mackey.” The Chief’s phone rang. After checking his caller id, he said, “Okay, that’s it for now. You know what to do. Don’t let Blush Valley down. Christmas is tomorrow and we want our residents to feel safe. We’ve a murderer to catch,” he said, sounding like a stoned cheerleader as he strode from the room.
The other four members of the team went back to their desks, grumbling at the implied knowledge that we would be working late, most likely through Christmas. Jack pulled out the chair next to mine, and turned it so he straddled it. “Vincent, what’s our move?”
Agent Mackey grabbed the chair on the other side of me and placed it in front of Jack and I. Sitting, he crossed his left foot on his right knee. I couldn’t help
but notice his red socks had a little reindeers on them.
“Nice socks,” I blurted, and then blushed.
An amused expression flitted over his face. “My grandmother gave me these.”
“Awwww, a grandma’s boy,” Jack said sarcastically.
Agent Mackey smirked. “Something like that.” He watched me as he spoke.
I hid a smile. Jack would be livid.
“Anyway, what’s the plan?” Jack asked, crossing his arms.
Agent Mackey leaned forward, his attention still solely on me. I started to get uncomfortable.
What was he doing, I wondered.
“We’re going to have Detective Hansen go undercover.”
“Undercover? I can’t. I don’t fit the M.O.,” I gasped, sitting back.
Poser and the others heard our conversation and started laughing.
“Little Rosy on a pole. I’d pay to see that,” Poser said.
Chapter 5
I think my brain shut down. The snide comments sounded far away.
A hand reached out and touched mine.
“Detective Hansen. Are you okay?”
At his touch, images flashed across my mind: He played catch with a young boy that looked a lot like him, only he had dark hair. The two of them ate at a pizza parlor.
Was the boy his, I wondered.
Snapping out of it, I pulled my hand from his warm one.
“Rose doesn’t like to be touched,” Jack retorted, glancing at me, his face concerned.
Agent Mackey leaned back. “Sorry. I won’t do it again.” His features darkened.
Rose, Undercover (Dead Roses #1.1) Page 1
