Craving Vengeance (4 page)

Shannon closed the file, rose from her chair,
and flung her wool coat over her shoulders. She planned to run up
the block to Subway and grab a meatball sandwich for lunch. She
stepped into the hall and nearly bumped into someone. He wrapped
his arms around her, lifted her off her feet, and spun in a
circle.

“Shannon, I’m so happy to see you.”

She was speechless. She hadn’t even seen his
face, but she recognized his hold, his scent, and his voice. Shock
and excitement rippled through her like an electrical current.

He pulled his head back just a bit in order
to find her lips with his. His kiss was rushed and firm at first
but it didn’t take long to turn soft and moist. Without conscious
thought, she responded to his lingering kiss. Then all at once, her
mind took over, and she realized what she was doing. She pulled her
lips from his and freed herself from his embrace.

She stepped back and flung her hand over her
mouth. Tears flooded her eyes.

He inched toward her, and she stepped
back.

“Shannon, what’s wrong? Aren’t you happy to
see your fiancé?” he asked as he handed her a fist full of
roses.

She stammered. She couldn’t seem to place her
thoughts in order to speak even one syllable.

“I wanted to surprise you on Valentine’s
Day.” His smile widened. “I’m guessing I succeeded.”

Shannon looked around him to find Anna
standing just beyond him, her chin nearly on the floor. He’d
rendered them both momentarily speechless which was highly unusual,
especially for Anna.

Anna closed her mouth and stepped forward.
“Shannon, aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”

Shannon cleared her throat and gestured
toward him as anxiety churned in her stomach. “This is Dr. Joshua
Meyers. Joshua, this is my boss, Anna Fontaine.”

Joshua extended his hand toward Anna.
“Pleased to meet you, ma’am.” He shifted his gaze between them.
“I’m Shannon’s fiancé. She seemed to leave out that little
detail.”

Anna shook his hand. “It’s nice to meet you,
too,” she replied before she shifted her curious gaze to
Shannon.

Shannon fought the urge to immediately
explain the circumstances to Anna. At this very instant she just
wanted to get Joshua out of sight. “Anna, would you mind if I took
a little longer lunch today?”

“Sure. No problem. Do what you need to
do.”

Anna spun on her heel and headed back into
the office as though what she’d just seen had made her forget all
about going out for lunch.

Shannon glanced at Joshua. He was smiling,
his bright blue eyes twinkling. He winked. “You missed me that
much, babe, that you need a little naughty afternooner right off
the bat?”

Shannon perched her hands on her hips.
“Somehow I don’t think we’re on the same page here. I think we need
to talk. But not here.”

She led Joshua down the back staircase and
out the door to the parking lot. He reached toward her and wove his
fingers between hers. She shook her hand loose.

He shot her a sideways glance and dropped his
hand to his side. “Shannon, baby, what’s the matter?” She refused
to look at him. Apprehension squeezed her chest. She hoped nobody
would see them together and tell Spinelli, but she was easily
noticeable as she clenched a dozen long-stemmed, red roses in her
hand.

Her pace increased. She needed to get to her
car and get him as far away from here as possible.

She slid into the drivers’ seat and slammed
the door as Joshua climbed into the passenger seat. Shannon cranked
the engine and pulled into traffic.

Joshua leaned toward her and nudged her
shoulder. “Come on baby, what’s the matter?” he asked again.

Shannon made an abrupt right-hand turn into a
parking lot and halted on a dime in the far corner parking stall.
Anger shot through her. Her lips quivered as she spoke. “What’s
wrong with me? You just announced in front of God and everybody
that I was your fiancé. I know this may be hard for you to believe,
but I didn’t sit around waiting for your return for the past two
years, just as I said I wouldn’t when I handed the engagement ring
back to you as you boarded your plane to Nicaragua. I’m in a
relationship now with someone I love. What if your little show gets
back to him before I get a chance to tell him about you?”

Joshua sat for a moment just gazing at her.
The corners of his mouth began to lift upward. The smirk she’d
grown to hate beamed radiantly. “I hear the words coming out of
your mouth, but they’re quite contradictory to the ‘welcome home’
kiss we just shared.”

Shannon ground her teeth together and inhaled
deeply before she loosened her jaw enough to speak. “You’re wrong.
That kiss meant nothing. I was caught off-guard.”

* * * *

Spinelli reached into his pocket and pulled
out the small black velvet box he’d picked up the day before. He
popped it open and stared at the heart shaped solitaire diamond
that sparkled like new fallen snow crystals. He snapped it shut and
stuffed it back into his pocket. How could he have been such a
fool? The stench of betrayal surrounded him.

He glanced back out the window from the
fourth floor stairwell to find Shannon climbing into the driver’s
seat of her blue Chevy Impala. A strange man slid into the
passenger seat. It was the same strange man he’d seen kissing her
not five minutes ago in the hallway.

Aren’t you happy to see your fiancé?
The words echoed in Spinelli’s head. Fiancé? What the hell? He
should have confronted Shannon on the spot, but that word,
fiancé¸
unnerved him. He heard it and ran for the stairwell
before he threw up in front of them both. He’d gone to Shannon’s
office to see if she wanted to get some lunch with him, but that
kiss and that word left him feeling like he might never eat again.
How could he have been so stupid? How could he not have known she
was engaged? And he called himself a detective!

He leaned against the wall. He couldn’t seem
to pull his gaze from them. He watched as they drove out of sight.
His jaw clamped down so hard he thought his teeth might break. His
ears hurt, and his vision blurred. Sweat slid down his back. What
the hell just happened here? He thought Shannon was happy with him.
She’d been with him every available moment for the past two months.
Who was this guy, and where did he come from all of a sudden?

He blew out a heavy sigh and shook his head.
He should have known better. True love, true happiness? Who was he
kidding? Those things didn’t exist for people like him. He’d
learned that lesson long ago.

Chapter Five

Spinelli’s phone
buzzed. He pulled it from his hip to find Walker’s face staring
back at him. He tapped the screen. “Spinelli here.”

“Are you about done with your lunch
date?”

Some lunch date.
Little did Walker
know, he hadn’t even had a chance to take Shannon to lunch because
she was too busy feasting on someone else’s mouth. Spinelli shook
the vision from his head.

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“You’re not going to believe this, but we’ve
got another one.”

“Another dead cupid?”

“Yep, downtown at the Morgan Bank
building.”

Spinelli was already headed downstairs by the
time he and Walker finished their conversation. He and Walker
headed to the crime scene.

They took the elevator up to the sixth floor
of the bank building to find several uniformed officers securing
the area. Nearly the entire sixth floor had been gutted and was
under major reconstruction. At least twenty somber looking
construction workers milled about the site.

The Police Sergeant stood off in the corner
talking to a large man wearing jeans and a plaid flannel shirt. His
white hardhat looked squeaky clean, and his boots looked new,
probably the job Foreman. The Sergeant waved them over. He gestured
toward the beefy construction guy. “This is the project supervisor,
John Buhr. He found the vic when they returned from their lunch
break.”

Buhr’s head turned in the direction of the
EMTs and the ME who’d just arrived. Spinelli could see a blurry
rendition of them through the heavy sheet of plastic lining a small
framed out room. Piles of sheetrock were stacked between where he
stood and the room, preventing him from seeing anything below their
shoulders. He and Walker headed in that direction with the sergeant
and Buhr in tow.

They stepped around the sheetrock and peeked
through the opening in the plastic. There he laid, cupid number
three, naked as a jaybird with the exception of his white
transparent wings. They looked like they were made out of a wedding
veil and molded with large pipe cleaners. Spinelli had seen better
wings.

The vic’s stiff body rested up against bags
of plaster powder. His bow and quiver of arrows lay next to him on
the floor. Dried puke crusted in a line from the corner of his
mouth, over his chin, down his neck, and onto his chest.

“Poisoned?” Spinelli asked Debra, the ME.

“Yeah, if I had to guess. The distinct smell
of almonds kind of gives it away. Maybe by the time I get back I’ll
have the pathologist’s report from Bethany for the first two
cupids. I’ll go see her right away. This is turning out to be quite
the Valentine’s Day.”

Spinelli shifted his gaze to the floor. “You
can say that again.” Visions of Shannon kissing the strange man
played through his mind.
This is what I get for letting my guard
down. I knew there was no such thing as true love, and this just
proved it. What in the hell was I thinking? Never again.
He
glanced at the dead cupid.
And look at you lying there on the
floor. What in the hell happened to you? A woman? Had to
be.

Buhr shuffled his feet, snapping Spinelli
back into reality.

Spinelli shifted his gaze to meet Buhr’s.
“How and when did you find the victim?”

Buhr’s eyes shifted from Spinelli to the
victim and then back to Spinelli. He ran his hand over his large
round face. “It was after lunch—about 1:00.” He pointed toward the
opposite corner of the large gutted room. “We’d been working over
there since we got here this morning. There was no need to come
over here. Anyhow, we broke for lunch at noon. We ate at the diner
across the street. When we got back, I came over here to get some
supplies, and I found poor Chad just lying here. I thought it was a
joke at first, but it didn’t take long to realize it wasn’t.”

Did Buhr really just call the victim by
his first name?
“You know the victim?”

“Yeah, it’s Chad Williams, the city building
inspector. He’s been on the site several times already, and I’ve
worked with him on other jobs.”

“The building inspector,” Walker
repeated.

Buhr nodded.

“Did you all leave for lunch?” Spinelli
questioned.

“Yeah. We don’t usually eat on the work
site.”

“Did you all eat together?”

“All of us except for O’Neil and Crass,” Buhr
said as he pointed in the direction of the crew.

Spinelli couldn’t really tell who he was
pointing at, but he would surely find out which of the crew they
were later. Then he and Walker would have a chat with them.

“Why didn’t they go with you?”

“I don’t know. They had some errands to run
or something. They’re not required to eat with us,” Buhr said
unable to hide the defensiveness in his tone.

Spinelli glanced toward the construction
workers. “We’ll need to talk with O’Neil and Crass. Which ones are
they?”

Rather than answer, Buhr yelled across the
room, “O’Neil, Crass, you guys need to come over here.”

Every construction worker’s head snapped in
Buhr’s direction, and then slowly most heads turned toward just two
of the workers. Spinelli would have been able to identify the two
even if the others hadn’t zoned in on them. The second Buhr yelled
their names the blood drained from their faces. O’Neil and Crass
slowly walked toward him and Walker.

“Buhr told us you didn’t eat lunch with the
rest of the crew today. Is that correct?”

They both nodded.

“What did you do on your lunch break?”

The shorter of the two men spoke for the both
of them. “We buzzed through the Burger King drive through and then
went to the jewelry store to get Valentine’s Day gifts for our
wives.”

Spinelli thought about the ring in his pocket
for Shannon. What would he do with it now? A crater the size of the
Grand Canyon filled his chest.
Damn it. Focus!

“So you both were together the entire
time?”

The two men nodded in unison.

Spinelli and Walker finished questioning the
men and headed back to the precinct.

“Are you okay?” Walker asked as he wove their
unmarked car through the heavy traffic.

Spinelli sat in the passenger seat staring
out the front window. “Yeah, why?”

“You seem a bit distracted. And when those
two guys talked about stopping by the jewelry store, your jaw
knotted so tight I was sure I could hear your bones cracking.”

“Well, we’ve got three dead cupids on our
hands, and it’s only 3:00. I guess you could say I might be a bit
distracted.”

“Nope, that’s not it,” Walker responded as he
signaled and turned left.

“What?”

“Nice try but we both know murder doesn’t
affect you like that,” Walker said as a chuckle escaped his lips,
“and don’t forget, I’m a trained observer.”

Spinelli sat silent.

“So, how’s Shannon? What have you got planned
for tonight?” Walker asked.

Spinelli’s jaw clenched. “She’s fine, and I
plan on catching a killer,” he spoke through gritted teeth.

Walker parked in the back lot of the
precinct.

Chapter Six

Spinelli flung his
coat over the back of his desk chair and sauntered over to Marsh’s
desk. He looked over his shoulder as he sifted through files on
Tony Rosso’s laptop. Marsh pointed at the screen. “Look at
this.”