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Chapter One
The detective should’ve been off six hours ago. Attending another crime scene was one of the last things he wanted to do. He had a cold bottle of beer waiting for him at home in his fridge. A plate of food, too. Though at this point, neither the beer nor the leftover casserole held much appeal for him at all. Especially compared to the appeal of his bed. His exhaustion was so thick, so thorough, he could feel it in his teeth.
Yeah, that’s a thing, he thought as he brought his car to a rolling stop at the edge of the yellow tape that impeded his way. Sore, tired teeth.
He gritted his together in a grimace. The scene itself appeared to be some distance away. Several squad cars, the coroner’s van, and a few unmarked vehicles, like his own, crowded the other end of the street. Police personnel milled about, looking busy.
The detective lifted his head and scanned for whatever uniform ought to be guarding this post—the entrance to the scene. He didn’t see one. His grimace intensified. Part of him was tempted to drive straight through the yellow tape to see how much of a commotion he could cause before they recognized him. Hell, maybe they’d shoot out his kneecap. Honestly, it didn’t sound so bad at the moment. He was that tired. At least he’d get a couple of months off. His foot even shifted off the brake pedal, and it might’ve moved to the gas if not for the sudden scurry of a blue uniform in front of his car at that exact moment.
A pale-faced female rookie met his gaze through the windshield. She recognized him. He could tell from her widening eyes and her sudden freeze. He knew her, too. Couldn’t recall her name, though. Just that she’d been in the room when he was handing out an assignment a couple of weeks back. Who was she? Janice? Janey?
Does it matter?
It never mattered. They came and fucking went.
He raised both eyebrows and waited for her to remember her job, simple as it was. Glorified bouncer. Even so, it took a second sometimes. Especially with the really new ones. Especially with him and his reputation for impatience. Put the two things together and, well, you got someone like Janice/Janey standing still when she should be hustling.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered.
She flinched like she could hear him and, at last, started to move. Except she didn’t head his way.
“What the fuck?”
She turned in the other direction and all but fled. She practically crashed into a man—their mutual boss, actually—who’d separated himself from the sea of other cops and was headed in this direction. She gestured backward and shook her head. Their boss, a man whom everyone simply called Dunlevy, no matter their stature at the PD, gave Janice/Janey a reassuring pat on the shoulder.
The detective watched him with narrowed eyes—just this side of a full-on glare. Dunlevy was liked around the force. That made him worthy of wariness, as far as the detective was concerned. He’d worked under the man for years and still didn’t have a read on his agenda.
And everyone has an agenda, don’t they? The detective’s hands tried to tighten on the steering wheel, and he forced them loose.
Dunlevy straightened his shoulders in a sign—as much as he ever gave one—that he was about to do something distasteful and redirected himself toward the detective, who grimaced and swung open his car door. Something was wrong. And that was saying a lot, given that this was already literally a murder situation.
“What the hell, Dunlevy?”
“Didn’t you get my text?” his boss replied. “Told you to go home.”
“Phone died right after I got the call to come out here. Haven’t had a spare second to charge it.”
“Well, you’ve done enough work for the day. You already pulled a double, and you can leave.”
The detective narrowed his eyes again. The double shift wasn’t news. In fact, they’d discussed it on the very call that had brought him here while his boss fucking apologized for asking him to do some more overtime.
His attention sneaked over to the scene, and Dunlevy shifted in place, giving the odd impression that he was trying to hide it. An impossible and ridiculous notion.
And a suspicious one.
It struck the detective, also, that he remained on this side of the standard yellow tape while his boss hadn’t budged from the other side of it. An unusual knot formed in his stomach. He recognized the establishment of a power dynamic when he saw one.
“What gives, Dunlevy?” he asked, speaking more carefully now.
“Nothing.” The single word was spoken too flatly to be anything but a lie.
“Let me through.”
“Go home.”
“Make me.”
Was it a childish response? Yeah, for sure. Was it an honest one, too? A hundred percent. Was he willing to force the other man to follow through on it?
You bet your bottom fucking dollar I am.
Dunlevy adjusted again, and the detective had the feeling that his boss maybe wanted to physically restrain him.
“You can put the cuffs on me, or you can let me through,” he snapped at the other man.
“Detective—”
He didn’t wait for whatever argument was coming. He shoved his way under the tape and took wide strides toward the crowd of people and vehicles. The tiredness that had plagued him the whole way here had been replaced with an anxious hit of momentum. Not quite adrenaline, but maybe its distant chemical cousin or something. The closer he got to his colleagues, the higher it climbed. It worsened even more when Janice/Janey quite literally jumped out of his way as he passed her.
What the actual hell is going on here?
Several people called out to him, but their greetings sounded like warnings. The knot in his stomach tightened. He didn’t stop, though. Not even when the coroner, Dr. Caitlyn Ironside—a woman he trusted and respected—told him to stay back in a pleading voice.
He’d almost reached the body, which had been covered with standard-issue sheeting for protection from the elements and prying eyes, when he abruptly stopped. His mind churned for a moment.
His too-nice boss had called him to the scene but now second-guessed it. His very presence had sent Janice/Janey into conniption territory. Now the coroner wanted him to go home, too. So maybe he should be listening. Maybe he ought to turn around. It wasn’t as though his brain was up and raring to go. Hell, it couldn’t even come up with a plausible explanation for this whole scenario.
The detective took a step back. He glanced around. Everyone was staring at him in a way that actually made him queasy—a sensation that was foreign to him except in terms of too many shots of whiskey after a long fucking day.
Go home, a little voice in his head said. Just go.
Except right then, a gust of wind howled in. With it came a plasticky snap. A heartbeat later, the standard-issue sheeting flew past him. The victim was quite suddenly, quite fully exposed.
Fuck. Oh, fuck.
If he’d been any less tired, had a bit more of his usual acuity, worked sixteen hours instead of seventeen, anything at all, maybe common sense would’ve suggested the possibility that the body was someone he knew prior to that moment. Instead, the realization was a cold shot to his kidneys.
He wished like hell he could look away. He couldn’t. His attention clung to her. To the dead woman. His eyes roamed over her. She was the only thing in his sphere of existence, and there was nothing he could do to change it. He cataloged her appearance as though it would help in some way.
No jacket. Off-white blouse, buttons missing. Navy skirt, long, but hiked to just above her knees. Silver bracelet on her left wrist. The very same outfit she’d been wearing just yesterday when he’d last seen her. When they’d last argued. When she’d accused him of following her when all he wanted to do was to keep her safe.
Fuck.
Her face was gone. Beaten to a bruised and bloody fucking pulp that was matted with crimson-stained blonde hair. But it didn’t matter.
Fuck. Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck.
Even without being able to see the bright blue of her eyes, he knew who this woman was because years earlier, he’d sworn to love, honor, and protect her. For better or worse. In sickness and health. As long as they both lived. Which clearly no longer applied.
End of Excerpt
