The rain started to fall softly as she got into the car. No one else seemed to be out this early on Sunday. Backing out she knew it would only take her a few minutes to get to the park. When she arrived at the entrance of the park she noticed that several police vehicles had already blocked off the area. She saw Carson Pierce looking around obviously for clues. His short cropped salt and pepper hair made him easily identifiable. Next to him was Dean Weston, a new recruit, scribbling in his blue notebook. He was only assigned to Homicide five months ago and so he was still trying to prove himself to Pierce, which was not an easy thing to do.
Getting out of the car, she went in the direction where everyone was gathered around the body. The victim seemed to be a young woman in her early twenties and she was lying on her back covered in her own blood. It appeared that she had several stab wounds and her lifeless blue eyes were staring into the beyond. One of the officers thankfully closed them. Her hair was in total disarray and Chelsea noted her jogging shoes were the expensive kind which most likely meant that she was a serious runner.
“Do we know who she is?”
“No,” said Pierce. “There is nothing on her.”
Chelsea looked around her quickly. There were several houses nearby and some had their lights on as people were waking up. News of this murder so close by would have parents fearful to have their children playing in the park unsupervised. She wondered if anyone from these houses had seen any suspicious action or heard anything like a scream.
“Who discovered the body?” She asked.
“A man called it in roughly an hour ago,” Weston said. “He didn’t identify himself but said he had stumbled across the body and so we came down.”
“What is the estimated time of death?”
“I’d give it about two hours maybe slightly less,” said Cara. She was the medical examiner who was kneeling by the body. Her face was tightly drawn as she silently carried out an on-the-spot examination.
Cara continued. “From the signs of abrasion on the body, it is obvious she did put up a bit of a struggle and it seemed as if the attack came from behind. This means she had little time to react to what was happening.”
“Well, it could be something personal or she just happened to be a random victim being in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Weston slipped his blue notebook into his pocket.
“So how do you wish for us to proceed?” He asked, turning to Pierce.
“First we’ll have to try and ID her…maybe by checking her prints and missing person’s reports.” Pierce said.
“What about putting her picture on the news?” Dean asked.
“Not until we have identified her and notified her next of kin. Here in Homicide we operate a bit differently from in the Drug Unit,” Pierce reminded him. “We can mention the crime on the news and withhold any name we might have and see if anyone comes forward with any information, but that’s about it.”
Weston fell silent while Pierce moved away as he took out his cell phone. Chelsea knew that his wife was a reporter for the local news so she would be able to get this on air quickly. This was normal procedure when the police had a Jane Doe on their hands.
“Is he always that brusque?” Weston asked in a peeved voice.
Chelsea smiled. “Pierce is an asshole to everyone this early in the morning. He will warm up, eventually. Just hang in there.”
“Well, I am going to help with checking people in the area asking if they saw or heard anything. We might just get lucky.”
Cara looked up briefly from the body, her brown eyes were peering over her glasses as she looked Chelsea full in the face.
“You look like hell… a sign that you have not been sleeping at nights.”
That was just like Cara, abrupt and straight to the point. Then she turned her attention back to making notes on her clipboard while her assistant took pictures.
“What makes you think that?” Chelsea asked, a bit taken aback by the suddenness of the unasked for comment.
Cara barely looked up. “I’m a doctor, remember? So I know the signs of sleep deprivation. You should be taking those pills. They’d help.”
“Thanks, but no thanks. I’m not going to rely on medicine. When my body wants to sleep, it will.”
Cara ordered her team to remove the body before answering. “You know what’s happening is not healthy. Plus you aren’t the only one who has found it hard to fall asleep. I guess it comes with the territory of being a cop. Listen, if you have something else bothering you and you wish to talk, call me anytime.”
“Thanks, Cara, I’ll remember that.”
Then on the spur of the moment, as if she had just discovered something, Cara said, “You know something, Chelsea? I know just the cure for you. You need to find yourself a good man, let loose, have a good time and I’m sure you’ll have no trouble at all falling asleep.”
A reluctant smile lit up Chelsea’s face briefly. Find a good man? That was not on her agenda at all. She trusted no one and never would. Only one burning desire occupied her mind at this time - finding the person or persons who killed her parents. This left no room for romance or anything else for that matter.
She did not answer but turned to watch as they loaded the woman’s body into the vehicle. Something fell and Chelsea bent down and picked it up after putting on a glove.
“Did you find a necklace on her?”
“No,” Cara said.
She handed the locket to Cara who carefully placed it in the evidence bag. As the medical examiner left, Pierce walked over to Chelsea.
“It will make the morning news. In the meantime, I need to go back home. Chelsea, can you take care of Weston for a while? He is shadowing us for the time being, and he can learn a lot from you.”
“Okay, I am able to manage that.”
“Good.” As he was about to step off, he lowered his voice and asked her in a confidential tone, “Is something bothering you, Chelsea?”
“No. And why do you ask?”
“Because you really look ragged around the edges, especially this morning.”
“Nothing’s the matter. I’m just suffering from a lack of sleep. Just go home to your wife and kids and stop worrying about me.”
“All right, if you insist. If you change your mind let me know and I will give you a call the moment I hear something.”
Hearing the same thing from two of her colleagues made her a little upset. She was not sure if it was with herself or with them for saying what they did. It seemed as if she was wearing her troubles on her sleeve for them to have noticed. What all this told her was that she had to resolve her problems soon or they might spill over into her workplace, and that would not be good. She had to get back to reading that file she had taken from the archives. There had to be some clues in there somewhere.
She watched as Pierce left to go home to his family. She couldn’t help wondering how he was able to function so capably at work when he had a wife and a pair of six month-old twins to cope with. That must take a good amount of juggling and no doubt his wife must worry about his safety on the job.
“Hello, Chelsea, where is Pierce off to now?” Dean asked, approaching where she was standing.
“He went home. In the meantime, you’ll stay with me.”
He couldn’t help smiling. “Is that all right with you? I mean, having to babysit me.”
“Um, that’s fine by me.”
“All right. So what do we do now?”
“Right now, I have to go back to my place and get something to eat and pick up something I forgot in my hurry to get here this morning. Then we can go to the office and start doing some paper work on this case.”
“Are you sure it’s all right? I don’t want to impose on you. I could meet you at the office.”
“No problem, while you’re there we can talk about the case and maybe come up with some angle from which to approach it.”
She seemed to have convinced him that it was okay to accompany her home and so together
they got into her car.
For a moment they drove in silence since Chelsea was not the talking type. She turned on some music to cover the silence.
Thankfully, it started raining bucketsful after a flash of lightning and a loud clap of thunder which made it difficult to carry on a conversation. She watched as the water rushed down the street sweeping away all the debris in its path. If only her problems could be washed away as simply as that. How different life would be! She sighed heavily.
“Are you all right?” Weston asked.
His question jerked her back into reality. “Me? Yes, I’m fine. I am just a bit tired. Didn’t sleep too well last night.”
“Happens to me sometimes too. Makes you edgy the next day.”
She nodded in agreement.
The silence returned. She was beginning to feel nervous. She was not used to having male company at her place, and worse, a colleague. Maybe she should have let him meet her at the station as he had suggested.
He noticed her discomfiture. “Is something wrong?”
“No, I am perfectly fine,” she lied.
She swung the car into the apartment complex. But they could not get out for a while due to another heavy downpour of rain. To break the silence that was becoming oppressive, Dean spoke.
“How long have you been in Homicide?”
“For six years now.”
“Is there a reason you wanted to be in Homicide?”
Should she be honest and tell him the truth? Maybe not. He did not know if he could be trusted.
“From when I was a child I always liked murder mysteries. That interest led to my decision to become a detective when I grew up.” At least that was half of the truth.
“A childhood dream, huh,” was all he said.
It was her turn now to ask, “So why did you become a homicide detective? I mean the Drug Unit must have been exciting.”
He chuckled awkwardly, but his body tensed, and she knew she had hit a nerve somewhere. This was not something he necessarily wanted to talk about.
“I loved my work in the Drug Unit. It was mostly undercover. I had relatives who were connected to the drug scene and this allowed me to infiltrate the group without being detected. No one knew I was a cop until about seven months ago when my cover was blown. I had to get out in a hurry, and then I was assigned to Homicide.”
“Well, welcome to the team. I guess we need to make a dash for it if we want to get upstairs. It doesn’t seem like the rain is going to let up soon.”
They both got out of the car and made a dash for the building. They were totally drenched despite the short run. Climbing the stairs, she quickly put the key in the door and they both went inside. Once there, she dropped her bag and hurried into her bedroom to get out of the wet clothes. It was only after she had changed into a new outfit did it occur to her that Dean would also be soaking wet and would need to change his clothes too.
She found him dripping on the rug.
“Sorry, I forgot all about you. But let me see if I can find something for you to put on.”
She disappeared back into the bedroom to see what she could find. He was bigger than her as she could not help noticing his broad shoulders and the muscular bulge of his arms. It took her some time to find a slightly over-sized sweatpants and large t-shirt. These would have to do until she could dry his clothes in the machine.
Returning to the living room a few minutes later, what she saw made her freeze in her tracks. Dean was reading her parents’ file that she had stolen from the office. She was planning to put it back in its hiding place on her return.
She marched across to him and grabbed the file out of his hands.
“How dare you? Don’t you respect other people’s privacy?”
He jumped at the vehemence of her action. “I’m sorry. I…I… I just thought it might be a case you brought home from the office…and so my curiosity got the better of me… I apologize.”
She held on to the file and tossed him the clothes she had found. He picked them up but did not know what to do.
“The bathroom is over there, you can change and then we’ll put your clothes in the dryer.”
Still seething, she watched him go. As she waited for him to return, she found herself thinking that maybe she was over-reacting, and the explanation he gave sounded plausible. Detectives were trained to take keen note of their surroundings. But was he always that snoopy? And what had he read in the file that she did not want him to know? And what was he thinking now? Maybe she should try and find out.
She did not hear him come back into the room until he asked, “Were these your boyfriend’s?” He meant the clothes.
She did not know if she should be angry or amused, but she forgot what she was about to say when she turned and noted how tightly the t-shirt was stretched over his muscular frame emphasizing his well-toned abs. She couldn’t deny that she found him attractive.
Realizing that she was staring, she got up quickly and said, “The dryer is just down the hall, the second door on the right.”
She watched as he left the room. She took the opportunity to glance through the file before putting it back in its hiding place. The sight of the photographs of her parents’ bodies from different angles clouded her eyes with tears. She hurriedly closed the file and put it away.
In an effort to control her emotions, she went into the kitchen and grabbed two mugs from the cupboard. They were bland, lacking color, just like her present life. To her it did not matter, or so it seemed, until now, when she had a visitor. She paused to wonder what he thought of her drab apartment. Before her mind could go any further in that direction, she heard him coming back along the hallway.
She handed him a cup of coffee and not wanting to get into anything personal, she asked, “So what do you think about the case?”
“If it is personal, he could have been stalking her for some time and knew her routine. She was in good physical shape and seemed to have been a regular jogger. If it is random, then we might have a serial killer on our hands.”
“Let us hope not.” Chelsea was glad for the distraction, her memories were threatening to overwhelm her.
Then quite unexpectedly, Dean asked, “So what about the case in the file you stole?”
“It is not a stolen file,” she said fiercely. “It is a copy and I have every right to it.”
“So you’re planning on finding the killers all by yourself?”
“None of your business!”
He guessed as much, so he decided to take a different tack. “The loss of both your parents at the same time and in such a horrible way must have been very traumatic for you.”
He saw her wince and knew that the wound had not yet healed.
Chelsea was torn as she tried to decide whether to talk about her past or not. She had never really shared her experience with anyone but her therapist, and only because it was mandated by her superiors. Dr. Moore kept on telling her that it would help if she talked to someone, sometime, even if it was a stranger. Right now she felt like not telling Dean anything, and at the same time she wanted to let it all out. This was so, especially after that frightening phone call this morning which she had not yet had the time to process. Maybe, if she spoke to someone, she would feel better and release some of the tension.
“I see you’re not ready to tell me yet, but I can wait.”
“Forever,” she said as she turned back to face him. His brown eyes locked with hers, and she wondered why he was being so persistent and trying so hard to be helpful.
Dean changed the conversation somewhat when he asked, “I find you and Pierce an odd team. He’s always bearish and you are so reserved. How does that work?”
She felt a little safer talking about work. “Pierce seems like that on the outside, but deep down, he is a warm, caring person. As for me, I don’t like being in the limelight. But over time, you’ll get used to Pierce.”
“Then what about you?””
“That’s not necessary.�
�
“I guess things are real different from the Drug Unit where you get close to the people you work with. Perhaps, because as an undercover cop, your life was always hanging in the balance.”
She wanted to be sure he understood Pierce a little better since they’d be working closely together.
“I think you should also know that Pierce is one of the best homicide cops, but right now, he is a bit exhausted because he has six-month old twins that keep him up at night.”
“Oh, I see. Then are you saying you’re not a good cop? From what I see, you’re just as good at your job as he is. But you always avoid the spotlight. It seems as if you are afraid of people.”
“I am not afraid, I just grew up learning to be invisible. It was how I survived.”
There was a brief silence, then Dean almost casually said, “I noticed that your name is not the same as your parents.”
Against her better judgment, Chelsea found herself explaining. “Because I changed it when I was eighteen. As far as I’m concerned, Chelsea Preston died then and I became a new person. I did not want to be known by that surname any longer.”
“And then you decided to become a cop,” he said slowly. “Do they even know you have a record?”
“Of course they do. Look I was bounced around from one foster home to the other. After my parents’ death I never mattered to anyone. I did some wrong things as a juvenile and I don’t expect people to understand, and to be honest, I really don’t care. But somehow, I did not want that record following me, so I changed my name and I managed to keep this concealed, and so I got into the force.”
She had never told this to anyone before, but somehow it just spilled out and she was beginning to feel a sense of relief.
“From my childhood, I have learned that the world is a very cruel place and that people can’t be trusted.”
“Not all people are bad, Chelsea.”
The gentleness in his voice was almost like a caress and brought fresh tears to her eyes and she blinked to keep them back. Her wounds had never healed, but she tried to conceal them as best she could. Now her hurt was being exposed to someone she hardly knew.
Romantic Thriller: Only Time Will Tell – A Romantic Suspense and Romantic Mystery Book: (Thriller Romance, Suspense, Mystery Romance, Suspense Romance) Page 2
