Temptation Rising (18 page)

“Nick will be fine. He knows this is the way to go, it’s just his nature to be rebellious.” Rome prayed that was the truth.

“I need another beer,” Nick murmured and stalked out.

“He’s getting edgier about this by the minute,” X said when they were alone.

Rome nodded. “I know. The appearance of the Rogues isn’t making it any better. He’s ready to kill first and ask questions later.”

X shrugged. “It’s our nature, Rome. I’m all for the government thing but we can’t deny our animalistic heritage forever.”

Rome knew that better than anyone. The slow prowling of his cat pressing against his human mind with daily persistence was proof. “I know. But there’s a way to contain it when possible. I don’t know that we’ll always be able to deal with the Rogues this way, but we have to at least start thinking along those lines.” He held the disk up. “Maybe there’s some strategies on here we can use.”

“Strategies? I thought we wanted clues to finding the killers. You still don’t remember anything else about that night?” X asked.

“We … I do,” he sighed. “I’m trying to do the right thing here, X.”

“I know. And you know we’ve got your back however you want to play this.”

“I want them dead.”

X nodded. “As soon as we find them,” he said solemnly.

And after they were dead, then what? A distant voice echoed in Rome’s mind, making him think about the answer.

Taking a seat on the couch, Rome let the disk rest on his thigh, closing then reopening his eyes. “I can hear the sounds, feel the tightness of the closet walls around me. And then I can scent them. All of them. My parents, Baxter, the killers.”

“So you’d remember if you scented them again?”

“Definitely.”

X was the one to nod this time. “Then it’s time we start lining up some suspects.”

“Yeah.” Rome glanced down at the disk again. “I believe you’re right.”

*   *   *

Kalina never thought she’d be happy to feel the slap of sticky humid air upon her cheeks, but as she stepped out of her car and began walking along the parking lot leading to the back entrance of the MPD, that’s exactly what she felt. She hadn’t even bothered to ask how her car had come to be parked in front of her building this afternoon when she’d come out. It hadn’t been there last night. But she was sure it had arrived in the same manner as Roman Reynolds had with his breaking-and-entering, bossy-and-controlling self.

Mrs. Gilbert had stayed in her apartment after Rome left. She’d stayed about fifteen minutes past her usual quota of five minutes standing in the hallway, with that god-awful cat glaring and growling at Kalina. Normally Kalina’s heart pounded the entire time she was in the vicinity of Ms. Kitty. Today she’d been so ticked off at Rome, she’d wanted to bare her own teeth and growl right back at the spotted cat.

As she walked across the asphalt, the low heels of her sandals clicked. She wasn’t dressed in normal work attire; if she was seen, she could just as easily be viewed as a citizen visiting the police department for some reason or other. Besides, it was too hot for a lot of clothes. The summer dress with short capped sleeves and flowing bottom that flirted with her kneecaps was as cool as she could get without walking naked through the city streets.

Her goal was simple: pull the file on the Sheehan case—the one she’d been working two years ago.

The narcotics division was on the second floor of what looked like one of the city’s plainest buildings. Stepping off the elevator, she heard the familiar buzz of interaction in what they called the bullpen. Departments were separated by glass-topped walls and double doors. On her way to the narc department she passed through homicide, nodding hellos to fellow officers but walking steadily forward. She wasn’t there to converse. There was a reason she was getting these photos—someone connected to that case years ago was after her.

The pictures from last night were tucked in her bottom drawer beneath all her socks. Thinking back now, she figured she probably should have kept the first photo. But something had told her there would be more. Whoever this was wanted something from her. Looking past the fear that assailed her upon first seeing the photos, she’d found something else—anger. Whoever had taken the photos back then was here now, attempting to intimidate her, again.

That was so not happening, she thought, using her palms to push through the double doors leading to her department. It was kind of quiet, a Saturday afternoon; most of the detectives were probably working a sting or coasting the neighborhoods talking to informants. That was the tedious part of the job, but it was necessary.

Her desk was near one of the large dust-covered windows. She hadn’t been there in weeks, so it was filled with files and mail and other paraphernalia her co-workers probably thought was funny to dump there. Sitting in her chair she pulled it close to the desk, being careful of the one wheel that usually stuck against the worn carpet on the floor.

She switched on her computer and while she waited for it to boot up pulled out her keys and opened the file cabinet beneath the desk to the left. Most files were kept on the computer now—vitals on all the suspects, details of the operation, official reports to be filed and copied to the court. But in her drawer Kalina kept her own personal file for each case she worked. The Sheehan case was a thick black folder worried from time and usage. She pulled it out, dropping it on her desk. Punching in her passwords, she pulled the computer file, browsing through the mug shots of all the suspects she’d investigated in the case.

None of them looked familiar or like the man who’d delivered the first picture. That man, she remembered, had a distinct look; he’d caused a memorable reaction she now thought was more strange than just a stirring of hormones. Something had happened when she saw that man, when he looked at her, said her name. Even now, thinking about him had her shivering, her skin itching. She sighed, sat back in the chair, and stared at the computer screen.

What am I missing?

Without any real motivation she pressed the arrow key, flipping steadily through photos. This time she wasn’t only looking for one face, she was looking for three more.

The three stooges from last night who’d also evoked some weird reaction in her. After a few minutes she sighed.

Nothing.

No pictures to identify them. No connection and … nobody was bothering her.

There were easily a dozen people in her department right now. None of them said a word to her. That could be construed as a good thing, as she really wasn’t in the mood for co-worker chitchat. Then again, it was still kind of odd.

If she took a moment to write down all the strange things going on in her life lately, she’d probably have a book by now. Things felt out of control. The goals she thought were so clear were wavering and she couldn’t figure out why. All she had to do was investigate one man.

That wasn’t going to be as easy as it seemed. Everything about him on paper profiled him as guilty. But his accounts were clean, his voice was mesmerizing, his touch downright sinful. He was right, she wanted him, craved him, and despised herself for it.

She wanted to work the case, find him guilty, move on. But he was a distraction. The photos she’d received were a distraction. Her mind whirled from one thing to the next and she took a deep breath to steady herself. Only for some reason the deep breath, the inhalation of familiar scents—warm paper from the printer, stale cigarettes from Kretzky’s old tweed jacket that he kept hanging in his cubicle for days he was called to court, the musty aroma of thirty-year-old carpet that badly needed to be ripped up and burned—annoyed her, making her feel nauseous instead of nostalgic.

In the pit of her stomach something was brewing. It felt like a longing, but she dismissed it as hunger. Food hadn’t been a priority by the time she’d awakened late this morning, and then her shower had been interrupted and Mrs. Gilbert arrived with that cat.

Cursing, she punched more keys on the keyboard. Something wasn’t adding up, or maybe she just couldn’t figure it out. Gingerly lifting the tattered file folder, she put it into her large purse. Shutting down her computer, she was grateful now for the lack of interest in her trip back to work. She left the narcotics division heading out of the building.

However, she was interrupted when she passed the meeting room midway between two departments. Double glass doors opened and people filed out. Detectives, plainclothes cops, and the chief of police walked by, all with sour looks on their faces. Something was up.

“Hey, Harper, what’re you doing here? Thought I heard you were UC.” Reed Sampson, a homicide detective with soft brown eyes and a killer smile, who’d asked her out too many times to remember, touched her elbow as he spoke.

“Hey, Sampson. Yeah, I was just there to see what else was going on and to follow a few leads I had on my case.” That was a lie. There were no leads. She couldn’t find anything on the guy, nothing except the feeling that he wasn’t all that he appeared. But that had really just become more pronounced in their last two encounters, and she wasn’t entirely sure if she was thinking along business or personal lines. “What’s happening?” she asked, nodding toward the line of men dispersing among the cubicles and toward the elevators.

“You haven’t heard? Probably not, since you’re on an assignment.” Reed nodded his head, directing her to his cubicle on the other side of the conference room.

Kalina really didn’t want to follow him, didn’t want to be in the enclosed space with him, knowing he’d try to hit on her once again. But she did want to know what was so important the chief of police was sitting in on a meeting on a Saturday afternoon. So she followed.

Dropping his folder, notepad, and pen on his desk, Reed hiked up his dress pants and sat. Kalina sat on the stool wedged into a corner across from him. “So what’s going on?”

“Two murders last night. SBFs, about your height and weight, sexually assaulted and ripped to shreds. Chief thinks there’s a connection to the senator and his daughter, who were both torn apart a few weeks back.”

Kalina remembered that case. Even if she hadn’t been a cop, it had been on the news for the first two weeks after the senator and his young daughter had gone missing. Their bodies had been mauled to the point where they had to make ID through the dental records. “Still no suspects on that one?” she asked.

Reed shook his head. “I’m with the chief on this one, it’s the same guy.”

“You think it’s a guy?” Kalina wasn’t so sure. She didn’t think it was a woman, but something about the pictures she’d seen of the senator and his daughter had made her think of something else. Something she’d sworn wasn’t true.

“You think a chick would do something like this?”

Reed was a nice guy, a nice dresser, a permanent fixture in the department. He was probably just the kind of guy she should be looking at to settle down with. But … not.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m narcs, remember.”

“That’s right,” he said, leaning back in his chair, flipping his tie over his shoulder as if that had some significant meaning. Other than to show her he was possibly partaking of too many donuts, she had no clue what that was. “You’re big time now, working with the DEA.”

The last was said with more than mild distaste. It was no secret that the local cops abhorred federal agents from any branch. Something about too much arrogance and too little street training. While federal agents—Kalina assumed—probably thought cops had too much time on their hands and didn’t know their ass from a hole in the wall. How she could play both sides she wasn’t sure, but it was a guess that made a lot of sense to her.

“I’m just working with them on this case.”

“You’re following that smooth criminal Roman Reynolds? Be careful of him,” Reed warned.

This was a conversation she definitely did not want to have with Reed. “It’s a job, Reed. Like all our others. So you have a list of possible suspects for these murders?” Changing the subject was the best course of action.

“Nah, these girls were nobodies. No family, no addresses, nothing.”

Just like her, Kalina thought with a pang to her chest. If not for her job, these women could have been her.

“So that means it’s not worth finding their killer?” Even to herself her tone sounded defensive. The surprised look on Reed’s face confirmed it.

“I didn’t say that. It just makes the pool of suspects that much deeper. If we had good background information, some type of friendships or connections, we’d have a starting point. At this stage all we know is that they were killed in the same manner.”

Kalina rubbed her palms up and down her thighs, willing herself to calm down. Suddenly she felt very edgy. “I see what you mean. Maybe I could pull some of my contacts, see if they’ve heard anything on the streets.”

Reed’s smile was slow. “You’d do that for me, baby?” he asked, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and reaching for her hands.

With an easy movement she lifted her hands, putting one up to her head to smooth down the sides of her hair while the other rested on the desk. “I could ask around to help get a lead on the case.”

“But aren’t you working on something right now with the feds?”

Hearing about the brutal murders had turned her attention from that, even though she wasn’t a homicide detective.