Critical Instinct
Janie Crouch
Calamity Jane Publishing
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
About the Author
Also by Janie Crouch
DEDICATION
* * *
This book is dedicated my husband, Kevin. If I could go back in time twenty years to our wedding day, the only thing I would tell my younger self is that I was making the greatest decision I could possible make by marrying you.
For all the times I’ve looked at you in the middle of a book and said, “this is the worst book ever” and you’ve told me how to fix it.
And how your advice on fixing it always involves adding alien drug runners and space ships. Because, you’re right, those things always make books better. Particularly romance novels.
I loved you 20 years ago, I love you now.
I will love you forever.
Chapter One
He sat with the pictures of the women in a perfect circle surrounding him. How innocent they all looked. As if they would never betray a man in the worst way possible. Abandon him then continue to take —to purloin— month after month after month.
Betray. Abandon. Steal.
Their pattern was unmistakeable and brutal. So he had created his own, just as brutal.
Strangle. Stab. Burn.
Each woman surrounding him now had a pre-determined place in the pattern. But regardless of where they fell in it, the lesson was the same: a woman would not be allowed to betray, to abandon, to steal from a man.
He was saving future men from these women. The men would never thank him, of course, because they would never know that he’d preemptively destroyed those who would no doubt attempt to destroy them.
But he didn’t need thanks.
He touched every picture gently, running his fingers across each face from left to right at the same angle. He touched all ten photos except one, the one that had broken his pattern.
But he would not think about her tonight. Her time was coming. He flipped that picture over and slid it back from him.
He turned to the eighth picture instead. This was the next one. The one he must focus on.
He ignored the voice in the back of his head that said the pattern was ruined. That until he took care of the one he pushed away, none of the others would have meaning. But that would have to wait. He couldn’t get to her now.
So he focused harder on the other picture. Memorized the lines of her face as she stared back at him in the photo. Touched the picture again as if he could stroke the strand of auburn hair that had fallen over her forehead as she stared out, no idea he was taking her photograph.
He studied the picture all night until it was all he could see in his mind. Would be all he would see in his dreams. Would be all he would think about until he made sure she would never betray, abandon, steal from another man.
* * *
Across town, in the deepest darkness of night, an artist stood in front of an easel, a colored pencil clutched in her fingers. Eyes staring unfocused in front of her, her hand drew the image of a woman. Beginning with a strand of auburn hair that had fallen over a forehead.
She drew —unable to stop, unable to see, unable to feel the blood dripping down from her nose and the agony of clenched muscles within her own body— until she finally finished and collapsed to the ground, exhausted.
Chapter Two
Damn it was good to be home.
Brett Wagner brushed the last of the cold rain from his head as he sat down at his desk in the homicide division of the Portland PD and turned on his computer. He’d never thought he’d miss the gloom of early spring in the Pacific Northwest, but he had.
South Florida, for all its bikinis, really only had two seasons: hot and melt-your-face-off hot. But it had served his purposes for the last fifteen years, since at eighteen he’d accepted a football scholarship at a mid-sized university there. It had gone on to give him a place to live, and a police force to join, and ranks to move up. Brett had loved it in South Florida, had thrived there.
Yet the 305 had never really been home.
But it had been as far from Portland as he could get and still be in the United States. A distance he’d needed when his parents and two younger sisters had been killed in a car accident and his life had pretty much imploded a few months before he’d finished high school.
Who would’ve thought he would end up back here where it all started? Brett took in the organized chaos around him. Phones ringing. People walking, talking. The constant click of keyboards, printers, doors opening and closing. Some things didn’t change much. Law enforcement stations were one of them.
“Here you go, QB. A gift from Captain Ameling.” A uniformed officer dumped a load of files, at least half a dozen deep, off on Brett’s desk.
“Seriously, Randal? More?” Brett rolled his eyes at both the high school nickname that still followed him even though he hadn’t played ball in nearly a decade and the files that had been piling on his desk all week. Captain Ameling was making his displeasure at Brett’s hiring known.
“That’s what happens when the Chief of Police is your uncle and you get hired despite the Captain’s wishes. Cold cases.”
“Chief Pickett isn’t my uncle,” Brett muttered, grabbing the uppermost file before it slid off the top. But he had been Brett’s father’s best friend and in Brett’s life so long that the title was more true than honorary.
“Look, man.” Randal’s grin was just as big as it had been in high school. “You don’t have to sell me. We’re all glad to have our beloved QB back in town. Terri says hearts, and certain lady lingerie parts, are already melting.”
More eye rolls. “Randal, you do know that leading a high school team to a state championship doesn’t actually have any bearing on real life all these years later, right? And definitely isn’t why I got the job here.”
“Your success record from Miami was impressive from what I’ve heard so nobody doubts you’re qualified for the homicide detective position.” Randal shrugged, still grinning. “I say take your passion and make it happen.”
Brett could practically feel his eyebrows finding a new home in his hairline, but he couldn’t keep from chuckling. “Did you just quote Flashdance to me as life advice?”
“Hey, I’m just saying don’t let it get you down. Captain Ameling’s just a little pissed that Pickett went over his head. Who knows, maybe Ameling thinks you’re gunning for his job.”
Because Brett’s dad had been police captain before his untimely death.
“Trust me, I have no desire to be captain. Hell, I’ll be lucky if I ever get to any current homicide cases the way I’m getting loaded with cold cases.”
“Well, Chief Pickett did mention you had a knack.” Randal clapped him on the shoulder. “I’ll leave you to them. Terri wants me to invite you over for dinner. Says there’s a number of ol
d friends that would love to get reacquainted.”
Randal waggled his eyes and Brett had no doubt Terri meant some of her cheerleader besties from back in the day. Tall and blond like Terri herself.
But Brett had already done that. Had married a high-maintenance ex-cheerleader only to be divorced by her a couple years later when she realized how much attention Brett couldn’t pay her because of his job. He had no interest in someone who needed his attention all the time.
Brett waved Randal off. “We’ll see.” The other man chuckled and took off down the hall. Brett hoped Randal wouldn’t be back with more cases. Or dinner invitations.
Brett would ease into those when he was ready. Maybe in about three or four years.
He opened and glanced down at the file that keep threatening to slip off the top. He grimaced; an aggravated assault and battery of a young woman from two years ago. The bruises that covered her face and body were difficult to look at, no matter how long he’d worked violent crime. But unfortunately, there was nothing particularly unusual about the case. It was just something terrible that happened to yet another person.
Brett closed the file and tossed it into a mesh organizing tray on his desk. Really, this case wasn’t even his problem. Assault and battery, even as horrific as this, wasn’t a homicide, so it wasn’t one of the unsolved cases Brett would be looking into.
With a population of nearly two and a half million in the greater Portland area, there were plenty enough homicide cases –hot and cold– to go around. He didn’t need to pick up any others.
Brett looked at his desk and sighed. It was already buried under paperwork, from HR forms he needed to fill out to all the cases that were being dumped on his desk. It was beginning to eerily resemble his new townhouse; buried in stuff Brett needed to sort through.
“Ah, the weary detective sigh. Well-known in departments all over the country.” Brett heard the familiar, friendly voice behind him and turned.
“Chief Pickett.” He stood up and held out his hand, glancing around to see if the chief’s presence was disturbing the workflow of the area. Evidently not since none of the other detectives or officers were paying much attention to the other man. It meant Adam Pickett spent enough time in this area that it wasn’t unusual for him to be here. Brett wasn’t surprised.
Brett smiled. “You down here to see where the real police work gets done?”
Adam shook Brett’s outstretched hand before slapping him on the shoulder good-naturedly. “Yeah, I can see all the police work right there.” He pointed at the multiple files littering Brett’s desk.
The chief sat in the chair next to the desk. Brett sat back down in his own seat and attempted to make some sort of organization of the mess on his desk. Not easy since he didn’t have a bulldozer.
“Yeah, I think Captain Ameling wants to make sure I feel welcome.”
Chief Pickett chuckled. “I may have mentioned that you had a good knack with unsolved cases.”
Brett shook his head. “Don’t do me any favors. I’m going to have to find my way with Ameling on my own.”
“Forrest is a good man. He’ll come around. At the end of the day we’re all on the same side. And, this will give you a chance to test your mettle. Prove you’re more than just the return of QB.”
“Jesus.” Brett laughed and rubbed a hand across his face. “You knew my parents before I was born. Please tell me naming me Quentin Brett wasn’t my dad’s way of basically assuring I would one day play football.”
The older man chuckled. “I can make no such assurances, sorry.”
“I would love for you to hang around and chat, Chief, but as you can see I have a pile of cases to get to.” Brett picked up the assault and battery file that had most recently been given to him. “Some of them aren’t even homicides. Like this one.” He passed the file to Adam. “Nasty Aggravated A&B, but I don’t think this belongs on my desk, unless someone was killed and I don’t know about it.”
The chief took the file but didn’t open it. That wasn’t a good sign. “This case isn’t a homicide. You’re right.”
“But you wanted the file in my hands.”
Chief Pickett –very much the Chief now and not Brett’s “uncle” Adam– sighed. “Yeah, I did ask for this one to be given to you.” He held out the file.
Brett took it and looked through it again. The case was two years old. The victim, Caucasian female Paige Jeffries, age 28, attacked by unidentified assailant. Had been abducted and severely beaten, but had escaped when the abandoned warehouse the perp had taken her to had caught fire.
“Pretty brutal assault,” Brett commented, looking at the photo of the woman in the hospital again. In it both her eyes were swollen shut, her nose, and possibly jaw, broken, if Brett had to guess.
“Yeah, she was lucky to have survived. I thought you might remember her. The two of you went to high school together.”
“Name rings the smallest of bells.” Brett couldn’t picture her in his mind. “And with our age differences, she would’ve been a freshman when I was a senior. And a lot of my senior year…”
Brett shrugged. The whole end of his senior year was a blur because of the loss of his entire family.
Adam knew that. Brett had moved in with his family. “I know. Just didn’t know if maybe you knew her.”
“Not that I remember. So what’s special about this case, if you want a homicide detective to take it?” Brett looked through the investigative report. “At a cursory glance, the police work seems solid. Two years makes it pretty cold. Although, I hate that this happened to someone from the school.”
“You into art at all?”
That wasn’t the question Brett was expecting. “Um, no. Not at all.”
“Paige Jeffries is a painter. Famous.”
“Wow.” He’d still never heard of her.
“World-renowned, as in, dining in the White House on more than one occasion. She’s very highly-respected.”
Brett looked at the picture again. With all the bruising it was difficult to get a true idea of what she really looked like. In Brett’s mind all world-renowned painters looked like Van Gogh or da Vinci — some old guy with a beard and part of an ear missing. Definitely not this young woman.
“So it’s a celebrity case.” Great. High-maintenance. His least favorite trait. “What is she, putting pressure on the department to find who did this to her?”
Not that Brett could blame Paige Jeffries for wanting to find the sicko who’d hurt her so badly. But still, celebrity cases often got ugly.
“Actually, no it’s not so much Jeffries herself who’s putting pressure on us. It’s the governor. His wife is a good friend and patron of Ms. Jeffries.”
Outside pressure from way up high to stay on the case. Even worse. Like it or not, politics were part of police work. Brett didn’t embrace it, but he accepted it.
“What do you need me to do?”
“Interview her again. I have a meeting with the governor soon and I want to be able to provide an updated report. Be able to say we are still actively investigating the case.”
Brett shook his head. “Adam, you know I’ll do anything for you. But I just don’t think this is a good use of my time. Why can’t you just send a uniform to get her statement? I doubt anything has changed at this point.”
“We’ve done that before and it blew up in our faces.”
Now Brett was definitely confused. “How?”
Adam shook his head. “Look at the hospital pictures again.”
Brett opened the file to study the photo of Paige Jeffries’ battered face and torso. He flipped that one over to look at the second picture, but it was just a duplicate of the first one.
“Yeah, it’s bad,” Brett told the chief, closing the file. “But I still don’t get what you want from me.”
“Look again, Brett. At both pictures carefully.”
Brett’s jaw clenched and he forced himself not to sigh. Adam didn’t waste time without a reason.
Except this wasn’t a photo at all. It had been drawn, not taken with a camera.
Now Brett understood. The amount of detail in the drawing was amazing. Holding it up side by side to the hospital photo, he marveled at the similarity. As if the artist had studied the photograph for every detail then copied it line by line.
“It’s a drawing,” Brett whispered, mesmerized by its horrific detail.
“Yeah, pretty impressive, isn’t it? She did it. Paige Jeffries.”
“The victim drew an exact replica of her own hospital trauma documentation photograph?” Brett shook his head in distaste. “That’s kind of messed up.”
Chief Pickett stood up and leaned over Brett’s desk to look more closely at the photo. “Well, this is where you come in and why I need you personally to talk to her.”
“Okay?” Brett still wasn’t clear.
“Ms. Jeffries claims she drew that picture before the attack. Weeks before.”
“What?” Brett leaned back in his chair, scoffing. “That’s impossible.”
“That’s what I’m pretty sure we told her at the time. And what every officer we’ve sent out to talk to her since has said. But she’s held firm.” The chief shook his head. “Artists. Go figure. Always looking for attention.”
Brett couldn’t think of any other reason why someone would claim to have drawn a picture so similar to the hospital photograph weeks beforehand.
He shrugged. “It’s just sort of sick if you ask me – no matter when she drew it.” Not that he believed she’d drawn it before the photograph had been taken, because that would be impossible.
“Like I said, the governor is going to ask about her at our meeting; he always does. This time I’d like to have something to tell him.”
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