Twisted Threads (A Cape Trouble Novel Book 3)

by Janice Kay Johnson

  Seeing Sean and Emily, he said, “You didn’t have to come. I’m not dying here—” His body jerked. “Damn it, that hurts!” He glared at the doctor.

  “Sorry. Tugged a little too hard.” She bent to her task.

  Emily hurried to hug Sophie and felt the way the other woman’s body shook.

  “Men are such idiots,” Sophie mumbled.

  Emily laughed, but shakily, her eyes following Sean as he ambled closer to watch the stitches being set. “Some of them are a little more reckless than others.” How ironic that Tom, who hadn’t been reckless at all, was the one who had died.

  “Aren’t we lucky.” Sophie sighed, then separated herself. “Thank you. I feel better.”

  Emily didn’t. Someday, that might be Sean. Probably would be Sean. His was a dangerous job. He gave her such a sense of security, she was able to forget. If their relationship lasted, she would have to live with a low level of fear for him.

  Or not so low, given that she knew how it felt to lose the people she loved most.

  Shock speared her. I don’t love him. How can I? It’s way too soon.

  She’d dated Tom for months before accepting that he was the one. Falling in love with him had been a slow, natural process. A feather floating gently down.

  This wasn’t like that at all. Even so, she knew with stunning certainty. She wasn’t the same woman she’d been then. Sean wasn’t the same kind of man. The circumstances were as different as they could be.

  She had responded to his intensely protective nature, and to the tenderness that was such a contrast. A contrast to what she’d known, too; Tom had been kind to everyone, including her. He’d been a contented, gentle man not given to much expression of emotions. The depth of understanding she sometimes saw in Sean’s eyes was new to her, along with the focus on her. And then there was the passion, shatteringly different than anything she’d known.

  Watching Sean laugh at something Daniel Colburn said, Emily discovered she, too, was trembling. Someday… She might get a call. A knock on the door.

  She couldn’t seem to draw a breath. I can’t do this again, she thought as her lungs seized, but discovered in an instant that she was just as afraid of going back to the lonely, empty life she had wanted to believe was enough.

  And…it was too late anyway, she realized in shock.

  “Room for one more in here?” a voice said behind her.

  She turned to see a man of a similar height and breadth as Sean, with hair as dark as her own and eyes a deep, espresso brown. Weary lines aged his face. He had to be in his late thirties, if not early forties. He didn’t look as if he smiled often.

  Daniel grunted a greeting. Sean came back to Emily’s side, placing a proprietary hand on her back.

  “Lieutenant Wilcynski, meet Sophie Thomsen, Daniel’s fiancé, and Emily Drake.”

  Those dark eyes skimmed over Sophie, then settled with more interest on Emily. She didn’t love the way he scrutinized her, as if he found her wanting.

  She decided she had to have been imagining it, since he greeted both of them pleasantly.

  Then his gaze met Sean’s. “Was it smart to bring her?”

  “Would it have been smart to leave her alone?”

  The lieutenant jerked his head toward the broad hall. “I need a minute.”

  Sean squeezed her arm in brief reassurance and went. The two men walked far enough away they presumably believed she wouldn’t be able to hear what was said. They were wrong. She didn’t catch everything, but enough.

  “What the hell were you thinking, bringing your girlfriend along when you picked up the Fisk girl?”

  With his back to her, Sean’s reply was unintelligible.

  “And now, tonight? Are you going to start taking her to work with you every day?”

  “I’m thinking keeping Emily alive is a priority.” Sean must have been mad, because she heard him this time.

  “We have half a dozen other potential victims. You haven’t requisitioned a bus so you can haul all of them along everywhere you go.”

  Sean said something. Emily could tell from Lieutenant Wilcynski’s face that he didn’t like it.

  “You’re a good detective.” His voice was hard, unrelenting. “Don’t risk your job.”

  Face enraged, Sean turned to walk away. He took all of two steps before he snarled over his shoulder, “If that has to be my choice, fuck the job.”

  Oh, God. What was he doing? Had he just quit, over her? Glaring past him at his boss, she hurried to meet him.

  “Don’t do this. I can go away, like Mrs. Kelley did. I’ll quit being a handicap. I’ll—”

  Sean shook his head. His eyes were turbulent and a nerve jerked in his cheek, but his mouth had softened. “No. I need you where I can be sure you’re safe. I wouldn’t be able to concentrate if you weren’t here.”

  “But—” Her sudden understanding had her stopping mid-sentence. The last time someone he loved had been threatened, the ending had been devastating. He couldn’t let himself fail again. It was no surprise that he’d go so far as to throw over his job if he had to, to keep her safe. She might even represent a form of redemption for him.

  Her protesting wouldn’t stop him. He needed to guard her, which meant she had to let him.

  So to hell with Lieutenant Wilcynski, who was watching them with narrowed eyes.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” Sean said. Gripping her arm, he steered her back into the room.

  She followed his example in ignoring his boss.

  The young, female doctor was just stripping off her gloves and smiling at Sophie, who now held Daniel’s hand. “Big, tough guys are the worst whiners.”

  “Hey!” he exclaimed.

  “A nurse will be in shortly to put on a dressing and give you information on wound care. Definitely don’t get it wet for several days. Make an appointment with your regular doctor in ten days to have the sutures removed.” She looked at Sophie. “Any redness, exceptional soreness, numbness or fever, take him for medical attention.”

  Sophie nodded. “Thank you.”

  “I’m still here,” Daniel grumbled.

  Feeling sick at being the source of the confrontation out in the hall, Emily had no choice about where she went. Propelled by Sean, she found herself on the other side of the bed from Sophie.

  Emily glanced down at Daniel’s bared forearm, sinewy and strong. In the harsh light, the dusting of hair glinted. A strip had been shaved, she saw. She couldn’t help evaluating the doctor’s work. “Those are really neat stitches. I couldn’t have done better myself.”

  He gave a choked laugh, eyes almost as blue as Sean’s showing enough amusement she suspected some of his grumpiness with the ER doc had been staged.

  Then he looked toward the foot of the bed. “Wilcynski. I didn’t expect you here.”

  “Sean called me. I was hoping you got close enough to this guy to be able to tell us something useful.”

  “I got close, all right.” He didn’t seem to notice that Sophie had shuddered. His voice was grim, his expression focused. “Most of what I can tell you, we already suspected. He was…rubberized. I couldn’t get a good grip on him. There wasn’t a lot of light, but I’d have seen some sheen if he’d worn spandex. Felt like a wetsuit.”

  The other two men nodded. Emily was as riveted as they were, but felt internal quakes at the same time. They were talking about the man who had twice gotten within feet of her, with only the bedroom door between them. This was the man who seemed absolutely set on killing her with the same knife he had used to slice nearly the length of Daniel’s forearm.

  “It may have extended over his head,” Daniel continued, “but he also wore what I’d guess was a ski mask, too. Other than that…hell. He had to be somewhere around my size. Athletic, strong. Unbelievably quick with that goddamn knife. I hate knives.”

  Sophie’s teeth actually chattered. She was holding onto Daniel’s hand so hard her knuckles turned white. He didn’t protest.

 
“For what it’s worth, not a smoker,” Daniel added slowly. “That smell tends to cling.”

  “Could you make out his eyes?” the lieutenant asked.

  He shook his head, but Emily thought she wasn’t the only one who saw some doubt on his face. “I should have been able to hold onto him.” Typical male, it figured that he was fixated on his failure to capture the man he’d set out to ambush. “My arm just quit functioning after he cut it.” They all watched as he managed to curl his fingers into a loose fist, but could tell it wasn’t happening easily.

  “He’d have done some real damage if you hadn’t been wearing a vest,” Sean observed.

  Emily let the point of her elbow planted just below his rib cage suggest he should have kept his mouth shut. He looked down at her in surprise, then up at Sophie, whose face had blanched.

  “Uh…sorry.”

  “The thought had already occurred to me,” she said tartly. “I told him this was an idiotic plan. That he shouldn’t have staked out the house by himself.”

  “Hiding two of us in a small yard increased the risk of being seen,” Daniel argued. “Sean wasn’t far away. He was alerted to be there fast.”

  “Apparently this particular suspect is even faster.” Red spots flared on Sophie’s cheeks. “Or smarter.” Her glare transferred from Sean to Daniel, who winced.

  Lieutenant Wilcynski cleared his throat. Emily would have suspected he was swallowing a laugh if she’d seen any sign he had a sense of humor.

  Daniel stared at the ceiling, clearly an unhappy man. “We still have nothing.”

  “Maybe not, but this was interesting.” Sean sounded thoughtful rather than discouraged. “Did he go after Fisk because he has a predetermined order and it was his turn? Or did he somehow know Fisk was the most vulnerable of the possibles we believe are on his list?”

  “If we hadn’t moved the girl, she’d have been as vulnerable. He may be saving her for last, though.” At least Daniel looked interested now. He had what Emily was beginning to think of as a cop’s dispassionate view of the world. In this mode, people were pawns to be moved from square to square.

  She knew both Daniel and Sean felt for victims. Sean had let her see a range of powerful emotions. But he seemed able to switch them off, too, so as not to cloud his thinking.

  “Because she’s, er—” Lieutenant Wilcynski joined the conversation, but cast wary glances at the women. He shrugged and apparently finished the thought. “The brass ring.”

  The brass ring? Oh.

  “Or he knows she’s gone.” Daniel said flatly.

  The silence that ensued felt uneasy to Emily. Sean frowned at a wall, Daniel at the glass front of the cubicle, the lieutenant at his feet. It was as if they were all thinking hard, but none of them wanted to share those thoughts with the others.

  And that scared her.

  *****

  The next day, Sean was in the act of parking a couple of slots away when he saw Jason Payne none-too-gently yanking someone from the backseat of his unmarked county car.

  Sean focused on the detainee as he staggered and snarled at Jason. Brown hair, camouflage pants and shirt, the kind of flexible tactical boots military guys and some cops liked to wear. Mid-twenties, maybe, dirty and raging mad. Right age to be A.J. Voight.

  Sean got out, locked with a press of his thumb on the remote, and walked over.

  Payne glared at his captive. “I asked my questions nicely, and what did the asshole do? He hit me.”

  Blood trickled down a swollen, already bruised cheek. The bruising ran under his left eye.

  The vet let loose of a stream of invective. The gist seemed to be that the cop was a lying piece of shit.

  “That so?” Sean said. “You shot at me.”

  Muddy brown eyes burned holes in him. “If I’d wanted you to be dead, you’d be dead.”

  Even though he’d never had any doubt that was true, Sean let his eyebrows flicker in a visual ‘yeah, sure, if you say so’. Then he dropped back a couple of steps in case Payne’s prisoner made a break for freedom despite being cuffed with plastic behind his back.

  Payne steered the guy into department headquarters and, ultimately, an empty interview room. As he pulled out a pair of metal cuffs to secure him to the chair that was bolted to the floor, the prisoner erupted. It took Sean and Jason both to hold him down, and he managed to head-butt Sean, whose nose gushed blood.

  “Son of a bitch,” he growled, holding on until the cuff clicked closed.

  The guy screamed and fought like a crazy man, his eyes wild.

  Backing away, Sean pressed his forearm to his nose, trying to stop the flow. His eyes stung and his whole face hurt like hell. Even so…something like pity squeezed him.

  Out in the parking lot, the homeless man – if that’s what he was – had been furious and defiant, but not nuts. Jesus, Sean thought, was there any chance he’d been captured over there at some point and brutally interrogated? Of course he’d flash back under these circumstances.

  Nonetheless, Sean backed out of the room with Jason, who took a last look through the glass, then said, “We’d better clean up. You’re a mess.”

  Sean ended up sitting on a toilet, head tipped back, a cold, wet paper towel pressed to his nose. Water kept running at the sink as Jason presumably rinsed off blood.

  “How’d you find him?” Sean managed to ask.

  “I’ve gotten to be buddies with Larry. I played the veteran card. We reminisced. Turns out he knew all along where this guy’s crib was. Kind of built into a hillside. Could have walked right by it and not seen it. Couple of sheets of corrugated metal as a roof, but they were covered with moss and branches. Metal chimney.” He shrugged. “Not the coziest place on earth, but I’ve slept in worse. Except the climate over there isn’t so wet.”

  Examining his feelings, Sean discovered he was annoyed for more than one reason. Patrol officers had been alerted to watch for the man in camouflage. Finding him wasn’t Jason’s job. He was supposed to have been concentrating on finding the name of the man Braden’s mother had lived with. What, had he gotten bored?

  Sean was a little chagrined that part of his irritation stemmed from the knowledge that brash new Detective Payne had been able to bring this guy in when he couldn’t. Stupid, when he hadn’t been looking for him except idly, when he was on the road. He had a few too many other things on his plate.

  Like Emily.

  His temper heated at the thought of her, a boiler being fed with fresh fuel. If Wilcynski wanted to fire him, let him try.

  He sighed and pushed himself to his feet. Jason still looked like he’d taken a couple of serious punches. The black eye was already in full bloom.

  “Better?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” Sean dropped the wet paper towels in the trash, then tentatively touched his nose. “Looks like I’ve quit bleeding.”

  “You’d better put some ice on it, though.”

  “You, too.” Sean assessed him. “You’ve already got a shiner.”

  Jason grimaced. “I noticed.”

  Sean detoured to grab two ice packs from the break room. Arms crossed, Wilcynski was waiting in the hall. Not much choice but to accept his invitation to join him in his office. Jason already had one of the not-so-comfortable chairs facing the lieutenants desk. Sean handed him one of the ice packs, then activated the other and held it to his nose.

  Wilcynski sat in his big desk chair and studied the two of them. “Good work finding him,” he said finally to Jason. “From the looks of you two, we have an excuse to hold him until we figure out who he is.”

  “No I.D.?” Sean asked.

  “Not that I found in a quick pat down,” Jason said. “Wasn’t sure whether I should search his hut without a warrant.”

  “You’ll have to pinpoint where it is,” the lieutenant said. “Once we know whose land he was on, we can get the warrant if we need one.” He switched his gaze to Sean. “What do you think?”

  “We could call Colburn, ask him to co
me take a look. It might be interesting to see how he reacts when he sees Daniel.”

  Wilcynski nodded.

  “He’s the right age, the right experience.” Sean gingerly shifted the pack on his nose. Sooner or later, he’d get numb – but, damn, in the meantime ice hurt worse than the original injury. “We’re reaching here,” he said finally. “Unless we find I.D. that says his last name is Voigt, how will we tie him to Braden?”

  “And?”

  “He can’t be over – what? – five nine? Maybe five ten? Kind of skinny, too.”

  “But strong and quick,” put in Jason, who had reason to know.

  “Granted. Still. You heard what Daniel said last night.”

  Wilcynski inclined his head. Jason hadn’t, so Sean explained.

  He went on. “The other thing is, he’s off his rocker right now. Yeah, the first time he broke into Emily’s house, he pushed it when he should have disappeared. But otherwise, every crime scene has been clean. Those murders were well-planned and meticulously performed. His failures since weren’t because he screwed up. Whatever he feels inside, the killer has to be able to compartmentalize, stay completely in control of himself. Is this guy capable of that level of planning and care? I don’t know.”

  Jason glared at him. “You’re the one who wanted him brought in.”

  “I did, and I’m not criticizing you.” He’d wait until they were alone to talk to Jason about his assigned task and why it had taken a backseat, instead of getting him in trouble with the lieutenant. “We need to talk to him, we need to search his place. I have my doubts. That’s all.”

  “I share them,” Wilcynski said unexpectedly. “I was watching while you two subdued him. That didn’t look like acting to me.”

  “Let’s go talk to him,” Sean said.

  Two hours later, they conceded defeat for the day and had their prisoner transferred to the jail.