Dirty Business (The Leah Ryan Mysteries - Book Three (Steamy Suspense))

by Tracy Sharp

  “Cal wasn’t playing,” Jack said, laughing.

  Cal gave a lopsided grin. He looked back at me, his face once again serious. “But Gabriel wasn’t there.”

  That wasn’t good. “Well, fuck. Where the hell is he?”

  “Leah,” Jack said. I hated that tone. It meant that something else was coming that I wasn’t going to like one bit.

  “Just tell me.” I let out a long breath.

  Jack looked at the ceiling, then square at me.

  “Jack, what?” I was feeling more alarmed by the second.

  He finally spoke. “The pregnant women are gone. Gabriel took them.”

  ***

  That news was a little worse than I thought it would be. Gabriel was gone. The pregnant women were gone, including Noel’s sister, Julia. It looked like Gabriel didn’t want to give up his cash cattle. I’m sure he’d made it seem like an honorable thing, taking them away from the compound. His flock would certainly see it that way. So would the pregnant women. But we knew better. The bastard didn’t have an altruistic bone in his sociopathic body. Those women were expendable to him, everyone was. He wanted their babies. They would net him a pretty penny.

  I felt sick. Not just because of the fact that we didn’t know where these women were to rescue them, but from the date rape drug Gabriel had given me. And it had been a date rape drug, just like I’d thought; Flunitrazepam. This particular drug does a variety of things to the victim which benefits the rapist’s goal. It’s a muscle relaxant, it’s a hypnotic drug, and it puts the victim out for at least six hours. Side effects include confusion, nausea and headache. All of which I’d been suffering. Mostly the nausea and headache, though. Guess I’d been lucky.

  But the fact that he used the drug on me begged the question: what did he do to me while I was sleeping?

  I had to submit to a rape kit. The fun just never ended.

  They tested me for sexual diseases. The worst part of it was that if he had raped me, I didn’t want to know. I really did not want to know. If I found out that he had raped me, I’d feel contaminated for life. It would be a violation so deep and so terrible that I was certain that I’d never get over it. And I’d commit another murder, this one for fun. But I wouldn’t know for at least a week, maybe two.

  The doctor told me there was no bruising or tearing. But then, I’d been unconscious. There wouldn’t be any.

  So as if that wasn’t enough fun, the police came to see me. I’d been asleep when they’d visited me the night before.

  I explained what had happened. Yes, I’d shot those two men after they’d shot the young police officer. I was not going to be apologetic about it. I added, glassy eyed, that one of them had also shot his own dog, after letting him loose on the cop.

  They told me not to worry.

  I didn’t think I’d heard them right.

  It could’ve been anyone who shot those cult members. Anyone at all, they explained. They weren’t exactly welcomed with open arms in the area. There were lots of people who knew what Gabriel was about. They knew that he ran a cult-like community within his compound. He had made many enemies. In fact, a fellow officer had lost a younger sister to Gabriel’s cult a few years ago. She’d vanished, was still missing.

  Both officers spoke, one after the other, taking turns. Everything blurred into the same warped image. I was tired. They said not to worry.

  I’d done the world a favor and those cult members had deserved what they’d gotten. This last part I wasn’t sure if one of the cops said on their way out, or if it came from my own mind. It didn’t much matter.

  ***

  Callahan took me home. When he opened the door I saw a large, dark, muscular figure standing at the top of the stairs and my heart leapt. I felt a smile spread across my face and I laughed out loud.

  She knew me, and her tail started wagging. She returned my smile with a wide one of her own.

  Man, there is nothing in this world like a rottie smile. Not one single thing.

  “Pango!” I brushed past Callahan and began to rush up the stairs to meet her, but was reminded of the wounds on my feet pretty quickly. I moved slowly then, reaching my hands out to her, moving them over her soft, smooth fur as I sat next to her on the stairs.

  “Oh, I see how I rate,” Callahan said, grinning.

  “Don’t you be jealous, this is a girl and her dog moment.” I cupped her blocky face in my hands. “Isn’t it, girl?”

  She licked my face and I wrapped my arms around her, hiding my face in her large neck and laughed into her fur.

  At that moment, life was good.

  ***

  I sent Callahan out for the basics; a bag of dog food and dog dishes. He hated to leave me alone, but I insisted. I set Pango up in the living room with a thick, folded blanket for her to sleep on until I could get her a giant dog bed. I took her out in the large back yard to let her get familiar with the place. Buddy used to do his business in the wooded area surrounding my house. I took Pango there and she did her thing. So far she was easy. In my experience, Rottweiler’s are. They are scary smart, sensitive, and they’ll give their lives to protect you. I love dogs, but I have a soft spot for rotties.

  We walked, well, I kind of limped along on my crutches, slowly around the property as Pango familiarized herself, sniffing and peeing here and there. She didn’t stray far from me, never more than a few feet. When Callahan’s car came up the drive-way, she stood still, ears perked, watching the car. When he emerged her tail wagged and she broke into an easy trot to meet him. She was part of the family already.

  My brother Jesse would love her. He’d moved to New York City the year before with a girl he’d fallen in love with. He worked as a network administrator- slash-computer expert at a large company in Manhattan. He was doing well. I wouldn’t mention my latest escapades to him. I knew him, and he’d drop everything to come and watch over me. I didn’t want him to worry or to put his life on hold for me. It was pointless. Besides that, I’d put Jesse’s life in danger a couple of summers ago because of the job, and I was determined that would never happen again.

  “Hey girl.” Callahan stroked Pango’s head before reaching in for the bags. There were several.

  “Did you buy up the entire store?”

  “Pretty much,” He smiled. “I want her to be comfortable.”

  He’d even gotten her a giant dog bed.

  “You deserve a treat.” I kissed him and gave him a devilish smile.

  “Yeah,” he agreed. “I do.”

  I searched the bags for bowls. “Cal, did you forget bowls for her?”

  He stopped taking items from bags and turned to me. “You still have Buddy’s dog dishes. I thought you wouldn’t mind if Pango used those. Is that okay?”

  I’d forgotten about Buddy’s dishes. I had other things she could use, too. Leashes and some dog toys that I hadn’t had a chance to open for him before he’d gotten sick. I’d always had plenty of spares since he’d torn through them pretty quickly.

  “Absolutely. I’m sure Buddy wouldn’t mind.” I went into the back bathroom and got Buddy’s giant aluminum food dish and water set up. The water dish was a plastic bowl with a gallon water jug attached. I felt a lump rise in my throat holding them again.

  “I miss you, Baby,” I whispered.

  Callahan poured Pango a generous bowl of food while I got her water ready. We got her fed and set up, and then I showed her where her bed was. She did a slow circle on the bed, and then lay down. She was tired, but wouldn’t close her eyes until we’d settled down ourselves.

  I took Callahan by the hand and led him, slowly and favoring my feet, upstairs to the bedroom. “I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you, Leah, so much.” He pulled me into a tight hug.

  I closed my eyes and pressed my face against his neck, breathing in his scent. Callahan always smelled woodsy and spicy at the same time. He smelled delicious.

  I pulled away and we undressed, leaving our clothes on the floor.
I climbed in between the sheets, luxuriating in the feeling of the warm, soft flannel against my skin. I’d taken sleeping in a soft, warm bed for granted. It was amazing how much you could miss simple things.

  He kissed me like he hadn’t seen me in months. I kissed him like I’d been afraid I would never see him again, moving my hands over his back, feeling the muscles under his skin. I breathed him in deeply, unable to feel close enough to him.

  We made love slowly, not breaking the kiss, our tongues twirling over each other. I brought my hands up and cupped his face, looking into his eyes. I wanted him to feel how much I loved him, to see it there in my gaze. I’d never given that to him before. It was as if I hadn’t had it to give, and suddenly here it was. I felt every movement as if it were new, yet Callahan and I knew each other so well it was like breathing for us. We knew every inch of one another, and we were always in perfect sync. It was a language we spoke without saying a word, and he felt so good that I never wanted the moment to end. I didn’t want to think about anything t except him and how perfect life was right then.

  At that moment, I didn’t want for a single thing. Everything was as it should be.

  But it didn’t last.

  ***

  Morning came mercilessly quickly, and once again, I felt cold. The air was chilled, the temperature outside having dropped to the low teens the night before. They had been calling for it, but I hadn’t wanted to think about it. I’d felt so cold when I was at the compound, cold enough for a lifetime.

  But here I was, pulling myself out of bed in the murky light of early morning, reaching for the phone to silence the loud trilling that had sliced through the slumbering silence. I didn’t want to leave Callahan’s warmth. I’d been curled up to his naked back, and I felt his absence profoundly as I pulled away from him and the frigid air found me.

  “Yes.” My voice was still thick with sleep.

  “Leah.” It was Jack. There it was again, the tight edge to his voice that I’d grown to know over the years as the harbinger of terrible news.

  I closed my eyes and hung my head. I didn’t have the energy for it, whatever it was. “Jack. Please.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  His heavy sigh went through me. It was bad. I stared at the gloom through the window. “Tell me.”

  “They found one of the women. Lucas just called me.” His voice was low and held a note of defeat.

  “No.” I moved a hand over my eyes and squeezed them shut. I felt Callahan move behind me, and a hand caressed my arm, the warmth of his skin unable to reach me now.

  Jack’s voice came over the line. “Look, I’ll go this alone if you’re really not up to it. Seriously, Kicks. Just say the word.”

  I said nothing for a long moment, considered it. “No. I’m coming. Where are you?”

  “Raven’s Hill.”

  “Okay. Give me ten minutes.”

  “Leah, it’s really icy. Do you want me to come and get you?”

  “No, I’ll be okay. I’ll drive slowly.” My eyes were still closed, as if by keeping them closed I could pretend that this was all part of a terrible dream.

  “I’m coming with you,” Callahan said, moving away from me and climbing out of bed.

  I felt a strange combination of relief and trepidation fall over me. I wanted Callahan near me, but I didn’t want him to see what we were about to see. I didn’t want those images to be burned in his memory for life, because of me. Just one more bad memory attached to us. “Callahan’s coming. We’ll be there in a few minutes. Sit tight.”

  “Good,” Jack said. “Okay.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Leah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “This is bad.” He was silent for a beat. “This is really bad.”

  ***

  It was five-fifty-seven. I pulled on some jeans and a warm fleecy top, and ran a brush through my tangled hair. I looked like hell and that wasn’t about to change anytime soon. My feet were still sore from my ordeal in the frosty woods with two of Gabriel’s finest, but they felt considerably better. I’m a quick healer, and I kept my feet gauzed so that I wouldn’t feel much pain. The hospital had given me some wonderful painkillers, too. And that made life just a little bit better.

  Pango lay in the hallway outside our bedroom. She had guarded the door. I doubted she’d do anything differently from here on out. She’d sleep on the dog bed during the day, but she’d guard the bedroom door at night. There was no point in arguing with her. It was just the way things were going to be from here on out.

  I poured some food into her bowl and patted her head before we left. I could hear the freezing rain battering the windows and I shivered. Callahan had used my remote car starter to blast heat in the car and melt the ice on the windows. That had been ten minutes earlier. We still had to scrape the hell out of the windows to get them clear enough to be able to see through.

  There was a layer of ice over everything. Trees were coated, their branches hanging low, being pulled down by the weight of the ice. Power lines were covered in ice, and I knew that it would be a miracle if we didn’t lose power. The last time we’d had an ice storm like this it had shut down everything, leaving thousands without power in the Northeast.

  We drove at a snail’s pace, which was fine with me, since I wasn’t in a rush to see what horror was awaiting me. Lucas had police connections, and since we were working the case of one of the missing women, there was a good chance that what was awaiting me was the body of Alexia Clemmons.

  The freezing rain let up, turning into a steady pattering of pure, wet rain in the warming air. I hoped to hell it didn’t freeze again. The roads were like a skating rink, with vehicles off the side of the road every hundred or so feet, it seemed.

  When we finally got to Raven’s Hill, there were several cop cars and rescue vehicles lining the road on both sides. The road was blocked, but Lucas had called us, so we were allowed to drive through.

  The sky was lightening from charcoal to a slate grey as the sky wept.

  ***

  We didn’t go right up to the crime scene, but we could see her clearly from where we stood. Several crime scene experts moved around her, not quite sure what to do with her. She was frozen, encased in ice. She lay with her arms at her sides, and even with the ice glistening from her we could see the large gash in her stomach. Her face was turned up toward the sky, mouth and eyes open, frozen in silent horror.

  We wouldn’t know for certain right away but I knew this wasn’t Alexia. This was the red haired woman, Colleen Ashburn. She’d gone missing two months ago, when she was seven months pregnant. Time of death would take a while to discover. They would have to thaw her out before they could gather any evidence from her. It was almost certain that the rain had washed most, if not all of the evidence, off of her.

  I moved a hand over my own abdomen, unable to fathom the barbarity of what was done to her. Her death had been brutal. Somebody had taken her baby from her. Hadn’t cared that she was a human being, only that she was an incubator for an infant they’d wanted. I couldn’t believe my eyes. As I looked at her, a gnawing pain began eating a hole in my chest.

  “Jack.” I could hear the moan in my voice, and my throat tightened over it.

  “I know,” he said.

  Callahan turned away, doing a slow circle on the road, his head tilted up to the sky. This was why he didn’t want me involved in the work that I do. This was exactly the reason why. I’d become tainted with it. Every time I was involved in a horrible case, I took part of it away with me forever. Wore it over me like a dark cloak. He already had so many dark memories attached to me from the last couple of years, and he would never be able to look at me without seeing this woman from here on out. This woman was one more memory for us to share. I wondered just how much more of this he could take.

  How much more could I take?

  But I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t give it up. As abhorrent as this crime was, I couldn’t turn away from Colleen. She ha
d nobody at this moment except those of us who were surrounding her. She’d died; terrified for herself and her baby, and nobody had been there to help her then.

  By Christ, I was going to do my best to help her now.

  Chapter Eight

  Callahan left me.

  I didn’t blame him. He didn’t wait for me to come back from the slowly thawing field before he got into my car and drove off. He didn’t call me. He didn’t need to. What could he possibly say? It had all been said before, and this time was worse, just so fucking much worse. The absolute worst any of us had ever seen.

  I wondered if he’d have his bags packed when I got home.

  “Who would do this?” I was speaking to nobody in particular.

  “One sick son-of-a-bitch,” Jack said beside me. He placed a hand on my back. His touch always steadied me. We’d been there for each other since we were teens. He was the one person I could trust would never abandon me, while I pushed every single person I ever loved away, Jack was always there.

  Lucas came walking over, long, grey coat billowing around his legs. He shook his head, eyebrows pinched together. His mouth was turned down as he spoke. “It’s horrendous.”

  Jack nodded. “Yeah, it’s fucking horrific.”

  “Can we get out of here, please?” I couldn’t stay there another second. There was nothing we could do for her there, and I could feel the weight of her death all around me in that frozen field.

  We headed to our office, stopping at the drive-thru to get coffee on the way. I ordered a large, black. Something with bite that I could wrap my hands around, keep close to me. Lucas followed close behind us.

  The office was warm. We had the heat on a timer, and six a.m. had come and gone, giving the furnace plenty of time to reach seventy degrees. I like seventy-two. Jack likes sixty-eight. We compromise and I wear a fleece I keep there. I threw it on now and curled into my favorite chair.