by Joey W. Hill
He stepped outside onto the front porch and found his sergeant waiting for him there, leaning against a column.
"Good punch for a guy twice your age." Darla straightened, reached up, touched his face. "I've got a pissed off Suarez in the dining room of the murder scene, Detective. You going to take care of that?"
"I clean up my messes. Is that why you're here on my crime scene, Sarge? To play daycare manager?"
Her eyes narrowed. "Careful, Detective. Maybe if the primary could keep his temper under control he wouldn't be thinking that's why I'm here. And I'll remind you," her countenance was hard and aloof, telling him he'd definitely stepped over her line, "that every crime scene that falls in our jurisdiction is my crime scene, as much as yours."
"I know. Jesus, Sergeant, I'm sorry." And he meant it.
Her anger defused as rapidly as his own, and she inclined her head. "You're pushing this one too hard, Mac. It's getting under your skin. But I'm not telling you anything you don't know. I should have given you some down time. You brought down that serial killer less than a handful of months ago and you haven't had a vacation since--"
"I'm fine." He waved that away. "I'm old enough to baby-sit myself, Sarge, don't worry. When we close this case, I'll cheerfully abandon the lot of you for a couple weeks in the Keys. Even if there's a major prison break and the streets of Tampa are swarming with death row inmates."
"I'll hold you to it," she responded. "I guess this one hits pretty close to home, hmm? Hearing everyone say he asked for it."
From her expression, he could tell she wondered the same thing herself, and what his position on it was. If it had been someone else, someone like Consuela or Suarez, he would have brushed it off, changed the topic. He'd never had any interest in being a salesman for his personal life, but she had gone out on a limb for him, and he owed her at least the answer to her curiosity. "It gets tedious," he admitted. "He asked for it as much as anyone asks for it who opens himself up to another person, hoping to find a connection."
Mac glanced back at the door, behind which Mr. Turner and his recriminations lay. "But my father would have felt the same as him. I was varsity, myself. Was offered a scholarship based on my football skills. I went into law enforcement instead. Most people I know feel like this about D/s. That's why you always hope to find someone with whom you can finally be who you are. Isn't that what we all want?" He said it lightly, wanting to shrug it off, but her eyes told him she wasn't buying it. Cops never did, but they also knew when to respect the boundaries and back off. He didn't want to do this now, not with the stench of blood in his nostrils.
"Why are you here, Sarge?"
"Connie called me before we located you. She felt I needed to see one of the pieces of evidence on the body and talk about it with you directly. She pulled it off before you arrived on scene, handed it over to me when I got here just now."
Her face unreadable, she lifted the plastic evidence bag that she'd been holding under her arm.
It was a folded sheet of paper, standard ruled notebook stock. His murderess was smart enough not to personalize herself with perfumed stationary. In small block letters, only taking up one line in the center of the page, was her message.
You're next.
Mac's brow furrowed. When he shifted, he could see through the kitchen window, where Mr. Turner sat at the table, alone now, face hidden by his hands, shoulders shaking in that harsh way that men who rarely cried did, as if each tear had jagged edges. "The killer wanted to threaten whoever found the body? That's new."
"No, Mac." Darla's hands closed over his, made him turn the bag over to read the back of the page, the name of the person to whom the message had been addressed.
Detective Mac Nighthorse.
"She's made you, Mac. She knows you're looking for her, and she's made it personal." Darla Rowe was one hundred percent business now, and Mac knew that look on her face.
"Damn right she has, and she's going to be sorry for it."
"You want to know what our shrink says about her leaving you a note?"
"I have a feeling you're going to tell me."
"Says she's gunning for you specifically now. She doesn't care about being caught. In fact she's probably hoping it's going to happen soon, because with this many kills under her belt so quickly, she's got the pain of a rabid dog driving her. So she doesn't care if she takes you down right under our noses. In short, Psych says she's at her most dangerous now. You've drawn her out, and she's pissed as well as challenged. We need to put a man in on the inside with the security team. I know you said you didn't want that, that you have privacy issues, but now I'm more concerned about keeping you alive."
He faced her. "I told you, that wouldn't work."
"She knows who you are now, Mac. You could bring the whole squad in there, and it wouldn't matter."
"Yes, it would. Because she still has sense, and it might make her back off me and take another couple of victims to distract us for awhile. It's a double-edged sword. If she knows me this well, she knows I'm the genuine article, even if I am a cop. It's male subs that get her off, rouse the bloodlust. I'm a double treasure to her." He waved the bag. "With this, she's looking for a one-on-one gunfight.
"And we're supposed to give her that gunfight?"
"We're supposed to make her think we're giving her that."
Mac hesitated, then made the decision he hadn't wanted to make. He had to accept Violet's offer, and overcome his desire to protect her. He didn't like her being involved, but she was a cop, had taken the oath just as he had, to protect and serve. It would be an insult to her not to allow her to help. Even more important, it would be a disservice to the three dead men. Whatever resources offered to him, he had to use them. For them.
Even so, it was an effort to hand over the card, not snatch it back when Darla reached for it. "She's my back up."
You're a male chauvinist pig, Mackenzie.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Buzz off, sugar," he muttered.
Darla gave him an odd look, took the card, looked it over. Did a double take. "You going outside the squad now, Mac?"
She's already on the inside with me," he said, keeping his gaze level with hers. "She'll watch my back and she wanted you to have that as an alternate contact. I hope..." he cleared his throat. "You've respected my privacy, gone above and beyond, but this is my case, my job. She's volunteering for the duty. I'd hate to see it come back and bite her in the ass."
"She got the experience to cover you in something like this?"
"Four years with state, a couple years before that as a Marine MP. I think she'll do well enough. What she lacks in direct experience, she's got in grit."
"All right, then." She pointed to the bag, "But this makes me real itchy, Mac. Let's close this one. At the rate she's piling up a body count, we're going to have to move fast to keep the S&M angle out of the news. And the families have enough to deal with as it is."
"No argument there."
"Detective?"
Mac turned, cursed inwardly as he saw the young woman standing in the doorway. The sister, pale but determined-looking.
"I'm Mara Turner, Edward's sister." She hesitated, then the words tumbled out of her, as if she were forcing them from herself rapidly so she'd get them all out at once before she could rethink the decision. "I needed to tell you...I knew about... Edward's preferences. When I was staying at his place once, I found a magazine. We talked and I was open to hearing about it." She colored at Mac's lifted brow. "No, I'm not into it or anything, not at all, but he was my brother, and I mean, it's the twenty-first century, you know? He was a good person with a good heart, and I trusted his judgment. He seemed glad to have someone... he trusted, to talk with it about, an open mind that linked him between that world and the one we knew him in. I just...I wanted to tell you that about three weeks ago he told me he'd been seeing someone really special. I think he was even a little in love with her. I told him he should introduce her to Dad, that this was just one aspect of his life. He didn't, I mea
n...I take boyfriends home to meet Dad, and we sure as hell don't talk about our sex life." She managed a ghost of a smile that trembled around the edges.
"He said no." Her attention drifted over to the house, to the bedroom window behind which her brother lay murdered. "He said she'd asked him herself, recently, if he was going to introduce her to Dad. Edward told me that he had said no, that he didn't want to mix that part of his life... he couldn't take the risk of integrating the two. He was worried he'd hurt her, which is why I guess he called and talked to me about it, because it was bothering him. He cared. He didn't like hurting people. Then a couple days later when we talked he said she was fine with it, that they were going out this weekend."
"Did he describe her? Give a name?"
She shook her head, brushing away the tears that wouldn't stop running. With a nod of thanks, she accepted the Kleenex Darla handed her from her purse.
"No," she sniffled. "He never told me that, said he had to respect her privacy as carefully as he'd guarded his own. I wish..." her voice hitched and she turned away. "I wish that hadn't mattered so much to him. I wish he were alive."
Darla moved to put an arm around the girl as she broke down completely again, sobbing. The sergeant murmured to her, cast Mac a quick glance before she guided her back into the house.
Mac turned and faced Edward Turner's home, his eyes hard and hot as fired steel.
"Your little bloodbath is over, sweetheart," he said between his teeth. "You come after me this time. You may take me down, but if I go, you're going down with me. So help me God, this is your last one."
He crushed the plastic evidence bag in his hand and headed back down the walkway, to start the painstaking process of going back over the room one more time for every possible clue.
"Mac, Mac!" Darla was hurrying after him, holding her radio.
"Sister okay?"
"Fine, fine. It's not that." She stopped at his side, taking a breath. "When you handed that card to me, I glossed over the name, just focused on the fact she was a trooper. But I know her name. You've been here, what? An hour?"
He nodded, his brow furrowed. "What is it, Sarge?"
The radio beeped and she raised a finger, responded. "I'm here, Roscoe."
"Yeah, Sergeant." The radio crackled in her hand. "I got it for you. The name of that trooper that got shot about a half hour ago."
Mac stared at Darla. Everything in him stopped. Blood, breath, heart. Darla's hand reached out, closed on his wrist as they waited three tense seconds for Roscoe to complete his message.
"Violet Siemanski. They've got her at Tampa General."
Chapter 18
As he had told Violet, his vehicle of choice was the Honda VTX motorcycle, and he was thankful that was what he had used to get him to the crime scene.
For the most part, he obeyed the law and practiced safe driving, except when he could find back roads where he could really cut loose and enjoy all the power the Honda had to offer. Now, he weaved in and out of Tampa traffic, went up on shoulders, barely stopped to check before he roared through intersections, cut the wrong way down one-way streets, and reached Tampa General's emergency room nearly nine minutes after he bolted from the Turner house.
It was breaking all the rules, and he didn't care. He flashed his badge as he went past the emergency staff. "The officer that was shot."
"Exam One," the nurse responded automatically, and Mac was around the corner and striding away before she could say anything further.
The curtain was pulled back about a third of the way, and so he saw her right away, sitting on an exam table.
She was wearing a hospital gown, her hair in a loose ponytail on her shoulders, her makeup gone. She looked tired, vulnerable, young. Doing her best to mask it, she was carrying on a half-hearted banter with the two troopers standing in the room, but he could feel her fragility. It wasn't just a resonance of his own fear. Where they couldn't see it but he could, her hand clutched the edge of the table. The rest of her was perfectly still, except for the slight alterations of her facial expression, as if she was concentrating all physical manifestations of what was going on inside her in that one hand, that one tiny tremor. The top tie of the gown was loose, so he could see the bandage. The bullet had taken a chunk out of the surface area between her collar bone and neck. An inch to the left, the slug would have torn through her throat. A few inches higher, it would have been her face. Few inches lower, through the chest.
It filled him with a fury for her, a fury he wanted to expel by breaking something, someone. But from Roscoe's report, there was no one to expend his violence upon. Violet had shot and killed her assailant, a junkie who panicked when she stopped him for an expired tag, who had fired at her point blank out the driver's window.
He stepped through the curtain, and her head turned. The first thing he saw in her face was panic. Then her expression altered, and what he saw there made his heart squeeze up hard in his throat.
Relief. Overwhelming relief.
Tears welled up in her eyes, but she blinked rapidly to try and hide the reaction that Mac had a feeling had stunned her as much as it did him.
He was to her in two steps, taking that shaking hand in his, zoning in immediately on where she was holding in her fear. He squeezed it, reinforcing the message that he was here. He was here. He wanted to pick her up, cradle her, but she was a cop, and he understood what she could and couldn't do. But he wouldn't keep it out of his face, his anger, his fear, his desire to shake her and hold her both.
He tuned in enough to realize an awkward silence had fallen as he and Violet stared at one another. One of the troopers cleared his throat.
"I don't believe we've met."
Violet opened her mouth, something to deflect questions, protect his identity, he was sure, but Mac turned, still holding her hand, and extended his other. "Mac Nighthorse. Homicide Squad, Major Crimes Bureau."
"Well, goddamn. Rick Martinez." The man took his hand, some of his wariness receding. "Didn't know Violet had a guy. Didn't know anyone was brave enough to take her on toe-to-toe."
"Someone was brave enough today," Mac said shortly.
Why couldn't they see how shook up she was? Why was he the only one seeing it?
Another uncomfortable pause. "Well," the other man said, sizing up the situation with an even look. "Hank Ramm. We were talking about who was going to take Officer Siemanski home."
"I'll take care of her," Mac said.
Hank, older than Rick, old enough to be Violet's father, looked toward her for confirmation. Mac wanted to be insulted, but he wasn't. He was irritated with the delay, but glad that Violet had men who watched out for her, though he wondered where the hell they'd been earlier today. It was an unfair question, since he knew troopers patrolled alone, but what was rational didn't mean a good goddamn to him at the moment.
He waited a heart-thudding ten seconds.
"He'll take care of me," she said softly.
The men nodded, and a few minutes later made their goodbyes. Hank pressed her opposite shoulder as he moved past her. "You call if you need anything, Violet. You did real good today. You remember that. You'll be back on the job in no time. Consider it a well-deserved vacation."
Mac waited until they left, then turned to her. "They're putting you on desk duty until they close the file?"
She nodded. "I know it's standard procedure, but I can't help thinking it's also because I'm young, less experienced, and I could have..."
"Don't. You're alive. No matter what happens, that's never something to regret, because if he'd do a cop, he'd do anyone."
She nodded, held up a warding hand as he took another step forward. "Mac..." Her voice broke and she sucked it in, shuddered. "I can't--"
"Just let me hold you," he said. His arms went around her and she held rigid for a second, fighting it, and then she had her face pressed against his chest to muffle her sobs, her hands clutched in his shirt, clinging hard to the skin and muscle beneath, digging in painf
ully as she shook.
Mac looked over her head and saw Hank at the curtain. The man nodded, gave him a thumbs up. He turned, and really left them this time, apparently satisfied Mac would do as he said. Take care of her.
"It's okay, baby." He held her as close as he could, bending his head down over hers, brushing his lips over the bandage. Just a graze, a glancing shot that could so easily have hit its mark. "You're all right. You're alive."
"I was so scared, Mac," she said, mumbling against his shirt. "I've never been so scared. I've never had to pull my gun, then he was there, reaching beneath the seat, faster than I thought anyone could move, and training kicked in. I was telling him to stop, but he wasn't, and he jerked it up at the same moment I got mine out and there was this single moment when he shot, everything in slow motion."
He'd gotten off the first shot while she was still shouting at him to stop. Mac's jaw tightened. Jesus Christ. It was as much prayer as expletive.
"And then, it was all so slow, I knew he was going to fire again. There we were, a foot away from each other, his finger tightening, and I fired. Right in his face. He's gone. I killed him. I took everything away."
"He took everything away." Mac caught her chin, made her look up at him, caught her tears on his thumb. "He made his choice the moment he made the decision to draw that gun. I'm taking you home. Let's get you dressed."
"I know what a lot of guys think, that women have no business on the force. And it's because of things like this. Look at me, I'm falling apart."
"No," he said firmly. "No, you're not." He lowered his voice, brought his face even closer to hers, so their foreheads were pressed together and she closed her eyes. "You said that I was a male chauvinist, that I didn't want my Mistress to be a cop. That's true, but it's not because I think you can't do the job. It's because I know you can, because you're brave enough to do what you did today, to keep your wits about you and do the job, and I don't want to lose my Mistress. You're a hell of a cop, Violet, and to the man who loves you, that's a terrifying thing."
*
She wanted to ride his bike rather than take a squad car home. She got on behind him and he gave her his helmet. When she slid her arms around his waist, and her body up against his, she was holding him a little tighter than necessary. He didn't mind. She could squeeze him like a python if she needed to do so. Before the painkiller wore off, he wanted to hurry and get her home. It was a flesh wound, but he knew she'd be sore all over tomorrow anyway. The first time you were in a gunfight, you tightened up every muscle, and your body stayed that way unconsciously for hours. He needed to get her into a hot bath, give her a massage.
