The Blind

by Shelley Coriell

  “She’s alive,” Evie said.

  Jon’s eagle-eyed stare didn’t waver. “I agree.”

  Ricci turned to her. “What about the folks who have access to the Beauty Through the Ages collection?”

  “Still nothing. Adam Wainwright, Brandon Brice, and Claire Turner have no direct ties to the bombings. I’m following up on who could have stolen Wainwright’s car and have some guys beating the streets to see if any other prostitutes were picked up by Vandemere. Since the security breaches occurred with Claire Turner, I’m digging into who has access to her Elliott Enterprises security key card.”

  “What about Elliott?” Knox asked.

  “He’s no longer a suspect,” Evie said.

  Knox’s jaw twitched. “Because he saw your Saturday panties.”

  With the evidence linking his homicide victim, Lisa Franco, directly to Vandemere, Knox’s intensity had shot up a few degrees. He was ready to blow. One of them needed to keep cool. “No, Knox. Because Elliott spends sixteen hours a day chained to a desk in a glass-and-chrome tower, and he has the phone records and e-mail trails to prove it.”

  “Yeah, right.” Knox rested his elbows on the table and leaned toward her. “Why don’t you tell us the real reason? Tell us about your new crime fighting tool. The one between your legs. Dip your wick and—”

  Evie flew across the table and slammed her fist into Knox’s jaw. The homicide detective’s head snapped back. Perfect position for Evie to grab the collar of his shirt. She drew his face to within inches of hers, her breath heating the air between them. “Care to rephrase that?”

  Knox’s lip curled. Evie twisted the fabric in her fist, tightening the chokehold. Hayden and Cho must have bolted from their chairs. They stood on either side of her like bookends.

  “Knock it off!” Ricci said. “All of you.”

  Just as fast as the molten fire erupted, Evie put a lid on it. She released Knox’s collar and held up both hands, fingers splayed wide. “’S okay.”

  “No, it’s not okay.” Ricci jammed a hand through his hair, which looked anything but Hollywood slick. “Knox, that kind of talk can get you booted off this investigation. Hell, it could get you a few weeks of serious R-and-R not of your choosing.”

  Knox wiped his mouth with his sleeve, the fabric smearing with blood.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Ricci continued.

  “You wanna know? You really wanna know what’s eating me?” Knox jabbed a finger at Evie. “A hotshot bomb specialist blows in and takes over. For a moment let’s forget about her and talk about the other girl, the one who really matters, Lisa Franco.” He walked across the room and spit at the trash can. He missed, the wad of blood and saliva hitting the wall. “Yesterday I saw a futon mattress covered in Lisa Franco’s blood.” He swiped the spittle from his chin. “For almost a month I’ve been busting my ass on this case because I owe that girl and her family a fair and thorough investigation, and I don’t want it clouded by a cop who’s nailing the guy at the middle of all of this.”

  “We’re on the same team, Knox.” Evie raised her hands in the air and waggled her fingers. “Wearing matching T-shirts and waving the same fucking pom-poms. No one, including Jack Elliott, is clouding my judgment. I got my eyes wide open, and God help Carter Vandemere when he finally gets within my sights.” Her heart crashed against her chest to the beat of the ticking clock.

  After a full minute, Knox wiped his mouth with his sleeve again and sat in a chair near the door.

  “Okay, everyone.” Ricci banged his palms on the table. “Two days.”

  “Two days,” everyone said in unison like a circle of football players breaking from a huddle. Two days.

  “You coming, Evie?” Hayden asked from the doorway. “Maybe you can talk Smokey Joe out of his funk.”

  “Yeah, I’ll be there in a minute.” She waited until the room emptied out of everyone but Ricci.

  Ricci stared at his splayed fingers, then at her. “You gonna report Knox for harassment?”

  “Nah.” She picked at a new stain on her jacket sleeve.

  “You’d have a case.”

  That would get them no closer to putting an end to the case that mattered. She shrugged. “We’re all stressed.” She studied the dirt under her right index fingernail.

  She was living Houston all over again. One of the officers on guard in the Houston disrupt, a man on her team, hadn’t trusted her to do her job. When the toddler who was being evacuated bolted from his mother’s arms across the courtyard where the IED had been planted, she dived instinctively at the kid, leaving her post. The officer on guard, bigger and stronger and more capable—at least in his own mind—pushed her aside, deciding he’d go for the grab, but his clumsy actions and complete lack of knowledge of the IED set off the explosive, injuring the child, her, and himself. The president had been right. She was responsible in part because it was her crime scene, and for a few seconds, she’d lost control of one of her men.

  “You gonna report me for belting him?” Evie asked.

  “Nah.” Ricci flashed her a bit of Hollywood bright. “We’re all stressed.”

  “You probably should,” Evie said. “Knox could squeal like a pig.” And if he did, the president would come down on her.

  “Not Knox. He doesn’t want it anywhere on paper that anyone got the jump on him, especially a woman.”

  Because women were softer, weaker. She stood, cradling a fist in the palm of her hand. Not in her world. “I’m not sorry I decked him.”

  Ricci clamped his hand around her shoulder. “Which is why I’m glad you’re here. Knox, too. He’s one of our best. I specifically asked for him to be assigned to these bombings.” He escorted her to the door. “You two are very much alike.”

  “I’m so going to try and forget you said that.”

  “I’m serious. You’re both good at what you do, and you both know it.”

  * * *

  4:06 p.m.

  “Hold it right there, Manny.” Jack popped the post in place. “I think we’re good.” He gave the fence a hard shake. Not a budge. “You get the post hole digger, and I’ll pick up the extra wood. We need to keep debris or anything else that will spook him at a minimum.”

  Sugar Run stood at the far end of the pasture pawing at the ground. This morning Manny had introduced Sugar Run to the pasture, going through careful precautions to get him safe and acclimated, but the fiery horse got skittish, bolted, and broke the fence. Lucky for all of them, the horse wasn’t hurt, although he looked sorely agitated.

  Jack rested a dress shoe on the bottom rung of the fence. “What do you need?” Jack aimed his words at Sugar Run. “You’re mad at the world and taking it out on a wooden fence post. It’s not working for you, my friend. You’re going to end up a cold, lonely old man.”

  Like him. Until now. Until Evie came into his life he hadn’t realized how cold, how lonely, he’d been. She was feisty but people flocked to her. And fiery. Oh, yeah, she had plenty of fire. He’d told Evie that he was involved with this case because he felt responsible. Then he admitted he was holding on to hope that finding the bomber would help him find his sister. All true. But the past few days he’d found life beyond the office, in things like cake, and sand between his toes. All thanks to Evie.

  “Is that what you need, big guy? A little filly to chase away the dark and cold?” But Sugar Run had been violent with the mares. “Then how about a friend.” He pictured blind Smokey Joe and Evie. Evie was fond of the old man, bringing him muffins, helping him find his way. Maybe that’s what Sugar Run needed, someone to help him find his way.

  Jack jogged across the pasture. “Hey, Manny. I need the vet’s number.”

  An hour later, Jack hopped out of the truck and walked to the pasture gate, unlatching the lock and pushing it open. Sugar Run’s nostrils flared, and his ears swiveled. Jack flipped the latch on the trailer and swung open the door. The lone inhabitant flicked her tail and sauntered off the trailer and into the pastur
e.

  “Mr. Elliott, are you sure this is going to work?” Manny asked.

  Unlike most of his business dealings, Jack was very much out of his element. “No.”

  Sugar Run danced from one hoof to another as the visitor pranced through the pasture.

  Manny joined him at the fence. “I’ve heard of buddy horses before, but not this.”

  “I couldn’t find a buddy horse on such short notice. The vet said this was the next-best thing.”

  “But a goat, Mr. Elliott?”

  Jack placed one dusty dress shoe on the gate rung. “Our Boy has made a pretty strong statement this past year. He’s been aggressive with other horses and acts out against humans. Yet he’s still lively and wants to run. I think he’s saying he’s frightened and not sure how to find his way in his new, sightless world.” Jack watched the goat picking her way across the pasture. “Maybe Miss Alfalfa can help.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Wednesday, November 4

  8:53 p.m.

  Jack’s Audi looked out of place in her motel parking lot next to an old Impala and minivan with missing hubcaps. The driver, on the other hand, looked very right.

  Evie hitched her bag on her shoulder and climbed out of her Beetle. She stepped into the circle of Jack’s arms, leaning into a cloud of air that smelled of Jack, although tonight’s version had a dash of dust and sweat.

  “How was your day?” she asked. Such a mundane phrase, one she’d heard thousands of times from her parents and her brothers and their wives. She had no idea how good asking this of someone could make her feel.

  “Got a new goat,” Jack said. “And you?”

  She held up her hand, one of her knuckles still swollen. “Got in a fistfight.”

  Jack took her hand and brought it to his lips. “Tell me about it.”

  “I’m fine.”

  He pulled her hips to his and leaned against the car. “Talk.”

  She ran the knuckles of her good hand along the front of his shirt. “Not much to talk about. The homicide cop popped off, and I popped him. Won’t be the first time cops took a swing at each other in the heat of an investigation, and it won’t be the last.”

  Jack tucked her hand into his arm and escorted her out of the parking lot. “Hayden said Knox deserved it.”

  Evie pushed him away. “You know about the fight?”

  “I’m keeping abreast of things.”

  She shook her head in awe. “Have I mentioned lately your issues with control?”

  He drew her to his side. “Have I mentioned I’d like to take a crack at Knox? Hayden said he’s been yanking your chain since the day you arrived and that there wasn’t a person in that conference room who wasn’t cheering you on.”

  “Now you’re acting borderline stalkerish. You realize that, don’t you?”

  “From the way it sounded, it’s a good thing you got to Knox before Hayden did.”

  “My team has my back. Always have. Always will.” She ground her boot heel into the loose asphalt. Unless the president booted her from the team. “The whole thing should have never happened. I swear it’s Houston all over again. I’m tired of having to prove myself.”

  “So stop.”

  “Says the person with the Y chromosome.”

  “I’m serious. You’re the best, Evie.”

  She tucked her arm in his and headed for her motel room. “You’re just saying that because you’ve seen my Saturday panties.”

  “I’m saying it because it’s true.”

  “Okay, I’m one shade shy of wonderful. So let me get a fresh set of clothes, then we’ll go back to your place and I might let you see my Wednesday panties.”

  Jack coughed out a laugh that turned into a smile. She loved that smile, and she could seriously get used to seeing it every night as she drifted off into sleep.

  Inside her room, she tossed her bag on the bed and dug out a clean pair of jeans and two T-shirts and pairs of underwear. In the bathroom, she reached for her toothbrush and froze. A card was perched next to the tiny coffeepot. Someone had scrawled, Evie, on the front and placed a heart over the i. Red ink.

  She tore open the envelope, and silvery confetti poured out. No, not confetti. Twisted bits of metal. A razor-sharp sliver speared her palm. Plucking out the metal shaving, she ignored the trickle of red oozing from her hand and took out the card, which was a photograph of a brown-haired young woman holding a blond-haired child. Both were wide-eyed and terrified.

  The earth tilted. She grabbed on to the bathroom counter with both hands. Her stomach heaved, and she swallowed sickness brought on by a sick man. The sick, twisted son of a bitch.

  “Evie, what happened to your h—” Jack’s gaze shifted to the photo, and he rested a knuckled fist on the bathroom counter. “He has his next victims.”

  Evie pulled in one breath, then another. “This is good.” Another breath. “This is good because right now we know that this woman and this child are alive, and they will be for at least another day.” She grabbed a washcloth and pressed it into her palm. “Call Ricci. I need to talk to Mrs. Francis, the night manager. Her office window faces the parking lot, and she pays attention to who’s coming and going.” Yes, this was very, very good.

  She sprinted to the manager’s office. “Mrs. Francis!” Evie pushed open the door to the motel’s front office so hard the door handle dented the wall. Yeah, she was fired up. The desk was empty. “Mrs. Francis?”

  Evie took a deep breath. Mrs. Francis was already baking. Banana nut muffins. She flipped open the desk gate, her boot heel sliding on something slick and shiny red.

  “Mierda!” She dropped to her knees next to Mrs. Francis. Mouth still. Chest still. The only movement was the blood trickling from a hole on the side of her neck. Evie slid her fingers to the older woman’s wrist. No pulse but still warm.

  A shadow sliced across her. She recognized the smell.

  “Get down here,” she told Jack. “Press your handkerchief against her neck.”

  Evie straddled the older woman and started compressions. “Come on, Mrs. Francis. Come on.”

  “What happened?” Jack asked.

  Push. Push. “GSW compliments of Vandemere.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  Without stopping compressions, she aimed her chin at the older woman’s torn sweater, a square patch of raw flesh showing on her shoulder.

  Within four minutes, the first squad car arrived. In eight minutes an ambulance pulled into the pocked parking lot, and only then did Evie step away, dragging Jack with her. Like her, his arms and knees were streaked with Mrs. Francis’s blood, and his face was deathly white, as if his blood had spilled onto the cracked tile of Mrs. Francis’s office. Regardless of what he saw during his street years, there was nothing compared to this ugliness. A world where white-haired old ladies who needed to supplement their Social Security income worked as motel night managers and got shot for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Her bloody hands fisted.

  Another car with flashing lights turned into the parking lot, this one with the word Detective written on the door.

  Like Jack she believed there were pockets of beauty. Of goodness. Of justice. And she was grateful for men and women who fought for justice with passion and force.

  Evie met Detective Knox at the door of Mrs. Francis’s office. “You see her, Knox? That’s Dottie Francis. She has fourteen grandchildren and bakes the world’s best blueberry muffins. The secret is lemon zest in the batter. She is Our Girl, Knox. You hear me?” She thumped Knox on the chest. “Our. Girl.”

  Knox’s jaw tightened, along with his fist. “You’re damn right.”

  * * *

  11:47 p.m.

  Ding.

  The elevator doors leading to his penthouse slid open, but Jack couldn’t bring himself to step into that small, brightly lit box with its mirrored walls and creamy white Italian tile. He stared at the congealed blood on the side of his shoe. The knot in his stomach lurched.


  “You want to take the stairs?” Evie asked.

  Twenty-four flights of stairs is exactly what he needed: the singular task of putting one foot in front of the other, the pounding echo, the narrow upward chamber with no distractions. “Do you mind? I missed my workout this morning. Not that I’m complaining.” Had it only been this morning that he and Evie shared a bed and fresh-squeezed orange juice? Jack tried to smile, but it never reached his lips.

  Evie opened the door to the stairwell. “Let’s go.”

  As they headed up the stairs, he forced himself to walk, but by the third floor he was jogging, and at floor six, he took off at a sprint. At the tenth floor he finally slowed and Evie, who’d stuck with him, said, “You can never outrun it.”

  A deathly pall. A sickly odor. The ugliness continued. Dottie Francis, the sixty-eight-year-old manager of the EZ-Rest Motel, was pronounced dead upon arrival at Good Samaritan Hospital. He wore the stain of that death, a stain that sickened and angered him.

  He slowed, and they took the next two floors at a slow walk until Evie stopped and held up her hand. “Did you hear that?”

  “Hear what?”

  “Listen,” she said. “This place is like an echo chamber. Someone’s on the stairs below.”

  He pulled himself out of the deathly fog. Evie pulled out her gun and flattened herself against the wall.

  Footsteps sounded below, slow, almost plodding. Heavy breathing. The air in the stairwell thinned. A shadow appeared on the floor below.

  Evie extended her arms. “Get your hands in the air.”

  The footfall stilled, but not the huffing and puffing. “Whatever you say, Lady Feeb.”

  * * *

  Thursday, November 5

  12:07 a.m.

  Evie jammed her sidearm back in her holster. “Dammit, Freddy. I’m going to take your camera and throw it down the stairwell.”