"You can't do that." She touched him. A wave of heat flamed up his arm. "The bonus on that car pays my bills. If you lock it up, I can't collect."
"The law is the law. The owner of record is missing. He was under investigation for his involvement in an autho-theft ring." He looked into her face and waited for a response, some inkling that she understood his decision, but determination had set her jaw.
"How long before I get it back?"
"The lab will dust it for prints and search for physical evidence. We'll need to determine if Otis committed any crimes with the car."
"This is because I'm a McKinley, isn't it?"
"No."
"You think because of what my family did for a living, it automatically makes me a car thief, too? Well, you're wrong. You're dead wrong and sooner or later you're going to have to stop hating McKinleys."
She pushed the front door open and slammed it shut in his face.
Brian stood perfectly still on the step, letting her words soak through his thick hide. The truth stung like a yellow jacket. Had he become so jaded he couldn't tell the good from the bad anymore? The day was when he'd had more faith in people, but the sun had long since set on that delusion. He shrugged off her observation and took the steps quickly. Once he reached his car, he scanned the street again and tried to shake the unease that gnawed at his mind and set his nerves on edge.
The cars parked in the street were still unoccupied. He watched the wooded area directly across the roadway for movement. Nothing.
If she was being watched, it would have to be by a phantom, because nothing was out of the ordinary. He climbed into his car and fired the engine.
Kendall leaned against the front door, feeling the full effect of Brian's heat. He had it in for her, but how deep would he dig?
"Kendall, what's going on?" Molly asked.
"Nothing, just a cop with an attitude and an appetite for McKinleys."
"Well," Molly whispered, "he can take a bite out of me anytime."
"You're awful!" She had to admit there wasn't much wrong with the Brian Littrell package--fair hair softly curling around his ears and forehead, pale blue eyes and just enough muscle distributed in all the right places to make any woman swoon. "Okay. He's hot, five million degrees, but cops aren't my style."
"Mmm.." Molly wagged her finger in Kendall's face and moved toward the door. "I'd make an exception for that one."
"No way."
"All the same, you need a man in your life. Someone safe."
"Where have you been, sweetie? Cops are about as safe as a five-year-old with a lighter."
Molly grasped the knob. "Okay, you've got a point, but maybe you won't ditch the idea completely?"
"Maybe." She hugged her friend. "Thanks for taking Kaden overnight."
"No problem." Molly waved and strolled down the sidewalk to her SUV. She climbed in and pulled away from the curb.
Kendall was about to go back into the house when she noticed the sleek black car on the opposite side of the street, exposed now that Molly's Suburban was gone. Normally it wouldn't have bothered her, but the windows were black. Tinted to the point she couldn't see inside the vehicle. A customized Honda?
Riding a wave of caution, she hurried inside and closed the door. She was being silly, but she'd never seen the car in the neighborhood. She looked around and spotted Kaden on the sofa, TV remote in hand and Rugrats on the screen.
She plopped down next to him and rubbed his head lightly, ruffling up his dark hair."So what did you and Molly do yesterday?"
"Nothing, Mommy. Just went to the zoo and saw the animals. I got some candy and we came home."
"That's not nothing, Kade. Did you thank her for taking you?"
"Yeah."
"Good job." She planted a kiss on his head and inhaled softly.
"Shall we go see your daddy today, before you leave?"
"No. It smells funny."
"We make exceptions for people we care about. Your daddy needs to see you."
"Okay." Kaden fiddled with the remote. "He lets me push him's buttons."
She patted his leg. "That's better. I'll dry my hair and we'll go." She stood up and felt the weight of guilt turn solid in her stomach, as it did every time they went to see Jacob Parker, Kaden's father, a twenty-eight-year-old man strapped in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. A man she'd put there with a dare.
Brian sat next to Sergeant Schneider's desk with the Romaro file in his hand. "His address of record is Taft Street?"
"Yeah, real dump. I talked to the landlord. Said the guy was four moths behind on his rent, claimed he hadn't seen him for almost a month. He opened the apartment, and damn if the refrigerator hasn't seen the guy in a month, either. The power has been shut off and the place was a stinking mess."
"Real winner, huh?"
"Obviously."
Brian studied the autopsy photos. "So...any idea who diced the guy?"
Schneider shoved a toothpick between the gap in his front teeth and rocked back in his chair. "Always looked like a revenge kill to me. Up close and personal, but I could never connect the dots. The crime lab didn't find any trace of evidence on the body. He was probably killed somewhere else and dumped in the river. No way to know where he went in. The killer didn't try to weight the body, guess he knew Mississippi mud does a scrub job."
"Did you talk to Romaro's family?"
"Nobody to talk to. Couldn't find a thread to unravel. It was almost like the guy appeared out of nowhere."
"An alias?"
"That's my guess, but he had ID on him."
"Prints?"
"We ran him through AFIS. No record."
Brian laid the file on the edge of Schneider's desk, frustrated by the lack of information. The address Kendall had given him for the house where she'd repoed the car was nowhere near the victim's apartment.
"I've got a list of deadbeats." He pulled Kendall's list out of his notepad. "My witness repoed Romaro's car along with the rest of these guys. Let's run them and see what shakes."
"No problem." Charlie took the list, eyeing it carefully. "Well, what do ya know?"
"You got something?"
"Orlando Durant. I can't believe he bought a car. Stealing them is more his style. I got a fax a couple of days ago from the Michigan State Police...they caught him doing 140 up I-75, headed for Canada. He was sitting behind the wheel of a brand new Maserati registered in his name. The kicker is there was a suitcase full of money in the trunk. They're holding him for reckless driving and eluding an officer. We've got first claim on him, but he's fighting extradition."
"Let me guess...grand theft auto."
"Bingo! But there's more. He's claiming someone in Louisiana wants him dead."
"Running scared?"
"Looks that way."
"How soon are we going to get him back?"
"Couple of weeks, if finance coughs up the money."
"I'd like to interrogate him, maybe he knows something about Otis Whittley."
"I'll let you know as soon as he arrives."
"Thanks, Charlie." Did Kendall know Orlando Durant? "I owe you one." He stood up and moved for the door.
"Anytime...hey, Brian, I had a visitor this morning."
"Oh yeah? Who?" Brian pulled up short and turned around.
"Byer stopped by for his annual how-the-heck-are-you chat."
Brian thought of the ex-partner who'd saved his butt more than a couple of times, but they'd fallen out of touch over the years. "How's he doing? Staying out of trouble?"
"You know Liam. He's top dog over at customs. Sitting on big money and bigger benefits. Something to do with manifest approvals."
"I heard that, but then he always pushed to get ahead. Not like you and me...happy to be at the bottom of the food chain."
Schneider smiled. "I wish the sharks at the top of the food chain would chew my butt off before next week. I've got to pass my physical."
"Good luck." Brian left the homicide division with a smile on his face. He hadn't thought of Liam in at least a year. They'd grown up in Lexington together, attended the same college and played on the same basketball team. They'd become fast friends and eventually went through the academy together.
His cell phone rang. "Littrell."
"Officer?"
He recognized Kendall's voice, laced with panic. "Kendall...what's wrong?"
"You better come out to the storage unit. There's been...some trouble."
"I'll be right there."
Kendall stood at the storage-lot gate, her face the color of a sun-bleached sheet. She put in the gate code and climbed in beside him.
"Did you touch anything?" The question came out like an accusation and he instantly regretted it.
"I'm not an idiot."
"I'm sorry." He touched her hand where it lay on the seat and felt her warmth invade the dark spots clinging to his mind. He put his hand back on the steering wheel where it belonged and made the turn down the row of units.
The door to the large unit at the end was open, the rear of the Beamer visible. "It's still there."
"You should see the inside."
He braked and popped the gearshift into park. "I'll get the lab boys over here and deal with the fallout later."
"Fallout?"
"This car should be in impound. I should have called it in last night." He looked at her now, caught by the way her hair framed her face and curled up on the ends, brushing her cheeks.
"I wish it was there, too. I'm probably going to lose my job over this."
"Don't panic. Let's have a look." He got out of the car and moved into the storage unit. Except for the bullet holes in the trunk and the shattered rear window, the car was pristine. He bent closer and looked into the side window. The seats had been slashed and lay open. Stuffing littered the floorboards, white and billowy like a collection of clouds.
"Who else knew about this place?"
"Just us...for security, I never told anyone where I took the cars. Not even my boss."
Brian straightened and moved around to the front of the vehicle. Caution slid through his veins and he stopped, but before he could warn her to stay back, she was beside him. He heard her sharp intake of breath.
DIE SLOW KENDALL. The words were painted across the windshield in dark red.
"Go outside." He leaned close to the glass and drew in a smell of the substance on the windshield. The iron-rich odor turned his stomach.
Blood.
He backed away and pulled the handheld radio off his belt. "Dispatch, officer 557. I need a lab team at A-1 Storage in Paradise, unit B-3." He was guessing, but whoever's blood had been used to paint the message was dead. His hunch was it belonged to Otis Whittley.
Kendall stood outside the unit, her face in her hands. He moved toward her and felt an overwhelming need to protect her from the ugliness inside and the danger outside. "I'm sorry you had to see that..." He stepped a bit closer, lowering his head. "It's probably just an idle threat made by some punk kid."
"Is it...blood?"
"Well..."
Realizing that the implication in his voice answered her question, she leaned into him, taking him by surprise. Like a bomb hooked to a physical timer, he found his arms around her, pulling her to his chest. "The Beamer will go to evidence, then to impound. If the lab confirms it's blood on the windshield, you're looking at posttrial before the car is released." The return of the BMW wasn't his worry. The threat bothered him.
"Do you think we were followed last night?"
"That would be my guess."
"Maybe not." She looked up at him and he saw a flicker of fear in her eyes.
"What do you mean?" He released her and stared into her upturned face, watched her swallow and then look away.
"I came over here this afternoon."
"Why?"
"I wanted to make sure you hadn't had the car hauled away. It's my livelihood. After you left this morning, there was a black car parked across the street. I couldn't see the driver or get a plate number, but after I went inside, it took off. I thought I was just being paranoid...I took Kaden to see his dad, and we made a swing by here."
"We have no idea what's going on." Brian grasped her upper arms. He had to infuse some caution into her.
"It didn't seem important."
"Everything is important. The threat on the window doubles it."
"Look, Officer--"
"Brian."
She hesitated, releasing a shuddering sigh before continuing. "Brian, I can take care of myself."
"Where's Kaden?"
"He's with a friend and her family. They took him to Disney World for a week."
He relaxed his grip on her and dropped his arms to his sides. "Do you have somewhere else you can go besides home?"
"I suppose..."
"Go. Chances are whoever did this watched your house this morning and followed you here. It's not safe. Someone means business."
"I can't leave."
"Look at me."
She complied at his stern tone, staring into his eyes, making his heart race as he searched her face, hoping she didn't fight him. "This isn't a polite request. It's an order. If I didn't think you were in danger, I wouldn't ask you to leave. It's better to use caution."
"How long?"
"As long as it takes to get a handle on this case."
"I have to put my life on hold while you look for a handle?"
"It's a lot more interesting to hunt McKinleys than to try and reason with them." He wanted the words to stick, to raise her awareness level to the danger he could feel in the air, but she gave him a sly smile instead.
"You'll have to hunt me if you drag this out."
"Understood."
Kendall glanced in her rearview mirror at Brian's headlights. It was comforting to know he was behind her. A foreboding feeling had taken hold of her at the storage unit and its grip was unrelenting. Did someone have it in for her? Brian certainly seemed to believe it. Should she believe it, too?
Flipping her blinker, she pulled down the quiet street lined with little square houses. It wasn't the best neighborhood, but it was one she could afford. She parked in the driveway, turned off the engine and climbed out of the Bronco.
Anxiety bubbled inside of her. The early twilight air held a trace of humidity, but it wasn't cold. Somewhere nearby a dog barked, probably at the end of a chain or shut up behind a backyard fence. The smell of a barbecue hung in the air. All was well. There was no visible cause for her feelings.
Brian pulled into the driveway and got out of his car. She studied him in the glow of the porch light as he moved toward her, like the hero in a vivid dream. Maybe he was the source of her unsettled emotions.
"If you grab a bag, I'll take you to your friend's house. I want to make sure you're not followed."
"You don't have to coddle me." She took the steps slowly. "I'm not helpless."
"I'm...painfully aware of that, Kendall, but you are the focus of my investigation and it got personal today." He was right behind her.
Turning on him, she prepared to reason herself into her own bed, but his features were hardened with determination.
"Don't even bother. Never mind that you can take care of yourself. I need to get some sleep tonight and if that means you stay somewhere safe, then so be it. Would you rather I slept on your couch?"
A twinkle of mischief sparkled in his eyes and she tensed as anticipation hatched in her mind and flowed into her bloodstream. "I'll get my bag."
She pushed her key into the lock. The door gave against the pressure and creaked open.
"Brian..." Terror sizzled through her veins.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"The door's been jimmied." The sound of gunmetal against leather alarmed her as he slid his pistol from its holster.
Was someone inside...waiting?
Brian reached for Kendall and pulled her behind him, taking her place on the step above. He stayed to the left and pushed the door all the way open.
In the back of the house he saw movement. For a brief second a human silhouette appeared in the hall and disappeared into another room.
"New Orleans police. Come out with your hands up." He reached inside and flipped the living room light on.
The once-cozy place was trashed. The sofa and chairs had been sliced to ribbons. Pictures lay on the floor with the glass smashed out. Chaos reigned.
"Go to my car." The house was still as death, but he'd seen the room the suspect was hiding in. "Lock the doors and stay down."
"Okay..." Though her voice was uneasy, she slowly shuffled off the steps behind him and a measure of relief invaded his body. The perpetrator would have to go through him first.
"Come out...no one has to get hurt." Brian crept into the entryway and scanned the dining room and kitchen. All clear.
Footsteps echoed on the other side of the kitchen wall, the distinct snap of a window latch clicked.
He hugged the wall, gun ready. He heart pounded in his ears as he slipped down the corridor and paused outside the room. "This is your last change. Give it up." The sound of the window being opened reached his ears. In an instant the suspect would be gone. Movement at the front door caught his eye and his heart slammed into his ribs.
A split-second decision solidified. He darted into the dark room, grabbed the man who was halfway out the window and locked him in a choke hold.
"I don't have anything, man!"
Brian patted him down and shoved him toward the doorway with his gun aimed at his temple. "Why are you here?"
"Let me go! Y-you can't do this!"
"Wanna bet?" He squeezed until he heard his prisoner gasp for air. "What are you after?"
Pushing him into the hall, Brian sucked in a breath and froze in place.
The suspect had a counterpart and he had Kendall--held in place, stiff with terror and with a knife poised just inches from her throat.
