The Broken

by Shelley Coriell

  Brown ran his tongue over his gold tooth. “We ain’t talked payment yet. I like beef, maybe a little surf to go with it, and a Bud. You think you can swing the Bud?”

  “Bottle or draft?”

  “Hot damn. Yep, one of them faces Muldoon slobbered all over belonged to that newscaster who got all cut up a few years back.”

  “Mike Muldoon had a picture of Katrina Erickson?”

  “Yep.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “I asked him about her because she seemed to be one of his favorites.”

  “Favorites?”

  “Yeah, he used to talk to her, call her ‘my pretty green eyes.’”

  * * *

  Tuesday, June 16, 12:15 p.m.

  Dorado Bay, Nevada

  Rose Heber dropped a saliva-covered hunk of leather on her daughter’s bed.

  “That is so disgusting.” Her daughter swatted the shoe onto the floor. “What is it?”

  “The end of your softball career.”

  Her daughter dropped the teen magazine she’d been reading. “What?”

  “I found Duchess chewing on it, and I told you last week if you let Duchess tear up one more set of cleats, your softball days are over. No more cleats, no more softball.”

  Her daughter scrambled off the bed. “Noooo! I can’t leave the team. We’re in first place.”

  Rose pointed at the twisted mass of leather. “You got an extra sixty bucks for a new pair of cleats?”

  “No.”

  “Then instead of playing ball, you’ll be playing with Duchess. The poor dog’s bored. That’s why she spends all day chewing things.”

  “Wait!” Her daughter picked up the mangled shoe. “This isn’t my cleat. It’s too small.”

  Mother and daughter looked at the Great Dane pup, all feet and spindly legs and soaking wet, a long lake reed entangled in her collar.

  “Looks like she’s been down by Mulveney’s Cove again,” her daughter said.

  Rose took the mangled baseball cleat. “The missing little boy. Benny Hankins.” Rose breathed out. “He’d been on his way to baseball practice at the park near Mulveney’s Cove when he disappeared. Oh, God!”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Tuesday, June 16, 2:00 p.m.

  Dorado Bay, Nevada

  Dozens of cars lined the dirt road snaking from Mulveney’s place to the lake, mocking the NO TRESPASSING signs posted every twenty feet. Hayden parked his car behind a Dorado Bay police cruiser marked K-9 UNIT.

  “Maybe it’s not the little boy,” Kate said, her voice a soft warble. “Maybe…”

  Hayden put his arm around her, pulled her close, and kissed the top of her head. Her pain for a little boy she’d never met reminded him of how deeply she felt. When they received news that Benny Hankins’s baseball cleat had been found near the tree with the rope at Mulveney’s Cove, she joined him in racing out the door.

  As he and Kate made their way to the shoreline, he spotted Lottie.

  “You got here fast,” Hayden said.

  Lottie flashed him her cheetah-print stiletto. “Got my running shoes on.”

  At the water’s edge, they flagged down a Dorado Bay police officer.

  “Dogs found Benny’s baseball bag in the bushes,” the officer said. “It wasn’t buried, just tossed aside, which is a good thing, right? I mean, the Butcher is a meticulous guy. If he did something to Benny, he wouldn’t leave the bag lying around, would he?”

  “It’s possible.” But not probable, although Hayden didn’t express that out loud. The Butcher was careful in his broadcaster slayings, adhering to the ritual and order that bound them. Nine-year-old Benny wasn’t part of the ritual. He was most likely a set of eyes that saw too much; therefore the killing and disposal of his body wouldn’t be as conscientious.

  One of the divers in the lake surfaced and called out, “We spotted blocks.”

  Despite the heat, Kate wrapped her arms about her chest, and he edged closer to her, the skin of her upper arm as cold as the deep blue lake water. He didn’t feel cold. Just numb.

  A moment later, the diver reappeared and dipped his head.

  Silence rippled over the search-and-rescue workers gathered at the cove. Kate leaned into his side. On his other side, Lottie let loose a growl. No, he wouldn’t make the assumption. Not yet. He wouldn’t believe that boy was dead until he had proof positive. Fifteen minutes later a pair of divers placed a small body on a tarp on the shore. Juvenile male. Three feet tall. Thin. Sandy blond hair. Skinned left knee.

  “Jesus H. Christ,” a man Hayden knew to be Benny’s baseball coach said with a choke. “It’s Benny.”

  The silence exploded into soft murmurs and not-so-soft sobs. The sounds pounded Hayden’s head, but he focused on the body, on the victim, on this possible link to the Butcher.

  “Turn him over,” Hayden instructed one of the officers. Even before the officer turned over the stiff, bloated body that had once been a little boy, Hayden knew what was there: a single puncture wound at the base of the skull.

  Kate’s fingers dug into his arm.

  “The son of a bitch. The goddamned, baby-killing, son of a fucking bitch!” Lottie quaked so hard, it rocked his body. Or at least he thought it was Lottie.

  “He’s a beast, a monster,” Kate said, tears streaming down her face. He drew her to his chest, and small, hot tears for a boy she didn’t know soaked his shirt. Yes, Kate felt deeply.

  And right now, so did Hayden.

  He tried to focus on the case, on the need for prompt and thorough response and investigation.

  Instead he saw himself sitting down with Benny’s twelve-year-old brother, Charlie.

  I’ll do everything within my power, Hayden had promised Charlie Hankins. His words slammed into his chest.

  Kate’s arm tightened around his waist, and when he looked down, she was staring at him. “You okay?” she asked.

  Hayden started to nod, but a single word rushed over his lips. “No.”

  Kate settled her forehead against his chest and murmured, “Me neither.”

  * * *

  Tuesday, June 16, 11:30 p.m.

  Dorado Bay, Nevada

  Kate didn’t know what frightened her more, the fact that the Broadcaster Butcher had killed a nine-year-old boy or the fact that Hayden had lost his jacket.

  She and Hayden had spent all afternoon and much of the night with the search team, scouring Mulveney’s Cove and the land surrounding it, looking for anything that would lead them one step closer to the Butcher. She had followed Hayden as he questioned homeowners and boaters and swimmers and joggers, desperately seeking information that would help them find the Butcher before he sunk his knife into another innocent body.

  Their futile efforts left her angry at the horror and injustice of Benny Hankins’s death, frightened that the desperate Butcher was getting closer, and shocked that Hayden’s stoic façade cracked. His jacket was missing. He took it off sometime during the search and forgot where he placed it.

  Now jacketless, Hayden unlocked the door to the cottage. Darkness greeted them, as did a soft snore rumbling from Smokey’s bedroom. Hayden took off through the house, checking Smokey and Maeve’s rooms along with the back and side doors. When he came into the living room, he switched on the light, set his computer on the coffee table, and slipped off his tie. For a moment she thought he’d let the slip of brightly colored silk fall from his hand to the floor, but he laid it carefully across the armrest of the sofa.

  “Are you going to bed now?” he asked.

  She listened to his words, really listened, trying to figure out if there was something else behind the question. Was this his way of saying, It’s been a bitch of a day, and I need to talk? or, Dammit, Kate, help me forget that today I saw a nine-year-old’s bludgeoned body.

  Because right now, that’s what she was dealing with. Every inch of her body ached for that boy and his family. She wanted to expunge the evil that descended upon them. A fast, hard rid
e on her bike would help. She fiddled with the hem of her shirt. So would another tumble in the front seat of the car with Hayden.

  As for Hayden, she couldn’t tell what was going on in his little pinky, let alone his head. Hell, since when had she been able to make sense of anything in this screwed-up world?

  “Goodnight, Hayden.” Now that felt comfortable, normal. Don’t know what to do? Run.

  Hayden tugged on the cuffs of his shirt. “I’ll check your room.”

  This, too, was good—Hayden the Efficient at work, taking care of her, taking care of the world. So he lost his jacket. No big deal. The world wasn’t falling apart.

  Although he’d repeatedly said the Butcher was too weak to attack her in the presence of others, Hayden checked her closet and under her bed. He pushed back the curtains, tugged on the lock, and jammed the small stick deeper into the window groove. She thought he’d turn away and march out, but he paused before the glass, as if mesmerized by the golden lake beyond her bedroom window.

  She studied his reflection. Was he thinking about the dead boy? About the Butcher? About his missing jacket? His face remained impassive. But then his body shifted a fraction and his forehead leaned against the windowpane.

  The tiny movement stilled her heart. For the past week, Hayden had offered her comfort. He had said and done things that helped her find strength. He had kept her sane, possibly alive, but here in her bedroom with his back to her, he’d just proved he wasn’t a rock. Moonlight streamed in through the window, painting streaks of gold through his black hair. He looked tired, but that was nothing new. Right now he looked…alone.

  “Hayden?” What could she say? Stay. I want to take you in my arms and hold you. I want you to hold me, and maybe together, the two of us can pretend to be whole. She clasped her hands behind her back and settled on, “Don’t leave me alone, not tonight.” There. She’d play one of his head games, appeal to the rescuer in him and make him think she needed him.

  A long breath streamed from his mouth and fogged the glass. “Is this what you want?” he said to the glass.

  “It’s what I need.” And it was the God’s honest truth. She needed him right now.

  Hayden faced her, and she bit back a gasp at the message in his eyes. I need you, too. It grew clearer with each step he took through the slivers of moonlight toward her.

  “Are you sure?” His lips barely moved.

  She laughed. “Oh, God, Hayden, you’re being thorough again.”

  “Obscenely.” He kept his face a serious mask, but something bright glinted in those heavy-lidded gray eyes.

  She thought about the feel of his lips on her neck, his fingers as they raced across her breasts, the swirls of warmth in her midsection. Her body didn’t lie. Nor did she. “Yes. I want this. I want you.”

  His fingers trailed up her arms. “I dreamed about you last night.”

  She swallowed. “You did?”

  His hands meandered along her shoulders to her neck, his thumbs tracing circles where her pulse pounded. “You were wearing a yellow polka-dot scarf.” The corners of his mouth tilted up. “Nothing else.”

  Her knees gave way, but she was saved from melting to the floor by his arms, which he wrapped about her waist. Her hands pressed into the silky smooth cotton of his shirt, and his mouth captured hers, taking away her breath, her thoughts, her fears.

  His tongue dipped past her lips, and he backed her toward the door, their hips and legs moving in tandem. “Smokey has good ears,” Hayden said as he pressed her against the door until it clicked shut.

  “Is this going to get loud?” she asked with a half laugh, half shudder of desire as she thought of Hayden—quiet, controlled Hayden—letting go.

  A groan—a delicious, un-Hayden-like sound—thrummed against her mouth. His fingers traveled to her shoulders, where he slipped off her overshirt, which he placed neatly on the top of the dresser. One by one, he stripped off her garments and placed them on the dresser. With each new bit of skin revealed, he took his time, savoring each inch, with his hands, his mouth, his eyes. Careful. Methodical.

  She wanted to shout, Stop going so slow!—but she didn’t.

  Instead she forced her hands to move slow as she took her turn at undressing him, even though an almost frantic need pulled at her. In the moonlight, his bare skin was more exquisite than his handmade shirts. Smooth, soft, perfect. And so right under her hands. She arched into him, molding her body against his. Hands roamed along heated skin, mouths traded sighs and delicious groans, and when he slid into her, her body shook in exquisite pleasure followed by a delicious and unexpected peace.

  * * *

  Wednesday, June 17, 7 a.m.

  Dorado Bay, Nevada

  A warm, soft cleft cradled him.

  He stiffened. So fast and hard, like he was twenty years younger. All hormones, no brain cells.

  His eyelids flew open. Kate. In his arms. In his mind. But not in his dreams. Oddly enough, he couldn’t remember having dreamed at all last night. Not of Kate. Not of the Butcher. And not of voices from his past.

  He checked the small clock on the nightstand. Another shocker. He’d slept six hours straight.

  His arms tightened around Kate, and he pulled her bare bottom into his lap. Her hair smelled of lemons, her skin of sex. He nuzzled his face against the soft waves of her hair.

  Last night had been imprinted in his mind. The moonlight setting her pale skin aglow. The almost unbearable sweetness of her breath as she let loose tiny gasps against his lips. The feather-soft brush of her fingers sliding over his chest and below. He ran his hand along her hip, and she gave a satisfied sigh and snuggled deeper into him. It would be so easy to spend the next few hours—frankly, the next few days—in bed with her. He ran a hand through his sleep-tousled hair. He could still feel Kate’s fingers in his hair, leaving sparks in their wake. Ten little lightning rods, jolting his skin and forcing him to acknowledge feelings he thought he’d never have.

  But he shouldn’t be thinking of Kate’s ten fingers.

  As he climbed out of her bed he thought of nine bodies.

  The Butcher had upped his body count to nine, almost double from five in just one week: seven broadcasters, including Shayna Thomas in Colorado Springs and the broadcaster in Oakland; Jason Erickson; and nine-year-old Benny Hankins.

  * * *

  Wednesday, June 17, 4 p.m.

  Dorado Bay, Nevada

  A screech tore from somewhere in the yellow cottage. Kate dropped Hayden’s laptop on the bed and ran to the kitchen, her heart in her throat and an all-too-familiar fear at her back.

  Smokey, who must have been napping, stumbled from his room. “What the he-ell was that?”

  Maeve stood at the sink, trimming the stems from a handful of wildflowers. “I’m not sure, but it came from the back deck.”

  Hatch, who’d been sitting at the kitchen table, took out his gun. Even though he motioned her to stay back, Kate followed him onto the deck. To her surprise, he pocketed his gun.

  “You, Miz Kate, have a visitor,” Hatch said.

  “Who?” she asked, trying to see around him.

  “I think the correct term is what?”

  Behind Hatch on the deck railing crouched the ugliest, angriest creature she’d ever seen.

  “Ellie,” Maeve said from behind her.

  “That devil cat?” Smokey laughed. “Must have busted out of prison.”

  Ellie hissed at them.

  Maeve patted Kate on the shoulder. “You know, there’s just not a lot to like about that cat.”

  Kate laughed. There was nothing to like about Jason’s cat. Not only was it the scraggliest, dirtiest thing she’d even seen, it stunk and wore a perpetual frown on its smushed face.

  She waved the air with the back of her hands. “Go away.”

  The cat stared at her with narrowed eyes. She shook her head and went inside. Another mangled cry sounded. Then, avoiding the smile on Maeve’s face, she opened the refrigerator and took out ch
icken from last night’s dinner.

  Kate took the bowl to the deck and put it on the railing. At first Ellie backed up, the fur at the back of her neck standing on end, but after sniffing the air, she pounced on the bowl, wolfing down the food without bothering to chew. Kate settled onto the deck and hung her legs over the side as she watched the attitudinal cat.

  “What are you going to do with her?” Maeve asked as she came out with two glasses of iced tea.

  Kate shrugged. “She probably won’t stay.”

  Maeve set the tray on a small table and handed Kate a glass. “Probably not. But she does look better, less feral.” Ellie, having inhaled half a chicken, sat on the deck rail, licking her paws and swiping them over her head. “Her coloring’s beautiful, if you can get past the rough edges.”

  For a moment, Kate stared at her reflection in the bay’s crystal-blue water. She had her share of rough edges, but last night Hayden called her beautiful. More importantly, in his arms and in his bed, she’d felt beautiful.

  Maeve sat next to her. “Hayden seemed well rested today.”

  Earth-shattering sex will do that to you. Her lips curved then froze as Kate snapped a gaze to Hayden’s mother-in-law, her face heating. This isn’t the kind of thing you talked about to a man’s mother or, in Hayden’s case, the closest thing he had to a mother.

  Maeve slipped off her shoes and dipped her toes in the water. “Kate, it’s obvious Hayden cares for you.” Kate almost dropped her iced tea, and Maeve laughed. “You look surprised. Hayden isn’t one for words about his feelings.”

  “That’s an understatement.”

  “You realize, don’t you, that he doesn’t know what he’s feeling half the time, but I’ve seen him watching you.” Kate reached up to the curl at the side of her head, but Maeve placed her palm on Kate’s hand and pushed it down. “Looking at you, Kate, not the scars and not at all that baggage you carry around.”

  “I don’t have baggage.” She was just the opposite. No ties. No roots. She looked at Ellie, who was running a rough tongue along her back haunch. No pets.