Tactical Advantage (12 page)

Annie quickly sorted through her first meeting with Nell Fensom, with the texting and secrecy and the 7th Street gangbanger Nick had mentioned. No wonder Nick had reacted with such concern. “Your walk with Mozart didn’t, by any chance, include a rendezvous with your boyfriend, did it?”

Nell’s slim shoulders tried to puff up like her brother’s. “Maybe if my family didn’t give me so much grief about Jordan, I wouldn’t have to sneak out of the house to see him.”

“Did he grab your wrist and hurt you?”

The teen’s delicate shoulders sagged. “It was an accident. Mozart started chewing on the backseat of Jordan’s car where we were parked and Jordan threw him out. I went to open the door to catch him before he ran off, but Jordan grabbed me and said we weren’t done talking.” She massaged her wrist, no doubt replaying the incident in her head. Her worried blue eyes sought out Annie’s. “Don’t tell Nick, okay?”

Annie’s heart lodged in her chest. Nick’s gut had been right about this guy. “If your boyfriend hurt you, I can’t keep that a secret. I’m a mandated reporter.”

“Fine. Then nothing happened.” She snatched the dog’s leash from Annie’s hand and headed for the door.

“Nell—”

The teenager hesitated before pulling open the storm door. “Jordan asked me about Nick.”

“What did he want to know?”

“It wasn’t like before, you know, like, ‘Is your brother gonna get in my face for kissing you?’” She glanced over her shoulder and Annie could see that Nell’s gut was telling her something was wrong with her relationship, too. “He wanted to know what kind of cop Nick was. He heard that Nick used to work on the anti-gang squad, and wanted to know if he still did.”

“Is Jordan part of a gang?”

“He says he’s not. And he doesn’t hang with them at school, but...”

“But why ask about it?” Annie turned back to the street, searching for Nick. He needed to be hearing this, not her. She hadn’t raised a kid, didn’t have any little sister she’d practiced giving advice to. But she’d weathered a lot of hard stuff on her own. Nell was lucky to have a family who cared. “Sometimes the people who bug you the most are right. Even when you don’t want them to be. If you think this Jordan is just using you—”

“But I love Jordan. And he loves me. He’s always been so sweet. I don’t understand why he got so mad.”

“Here.” Annie opened the flap of her purse and fished inside for her card wallet. She pulled out one of her business cards and handed it to Nell. “Call me sometime. Maybe we could meet for tea or a soda. Just the two of us. We could talk. I bet it’s hard to get some quiet time to think when you’re surrounded by so many outgoing people.”

Nell took the card and summoned half a smile. “You noticed, huh?”

“It doesn’t take a forensic scientist to figure that out.”

The smile widened and she stuffed the card into her coat pocket. “Thanks. We’ll see.” And then the smile vanished. “Jordan?”

Annie spun around to see an ice-blue Impala with a young Latino driver turn onto the street. With its music thumping loudly enough to vibrate the icicles hanging from the gutters, the car cruised by the front of the house at a snail’s pace, giving Annie plenty of time to see the boy’s olive-skinned face and dark eyes. He put two fingers to his lips and blew a kiss to Nell. A harmless enough gesture if Annie hadn’t just heard about his temper and his curiosity about a former anti-gang cop.

“Come on.” She reached for Nell’s arm. Annie didn’t like being this exposed to watching eyes, not after last night. And a chill crawled right up her spine when Jordan’s dark gaze settled on her and he blew a second kiss. That wasn’t flirting. That was cockiness. That was a taunt. It felt like a threat. Annie pulled the storm door open herself. “We’d better get inside.”

“Nell?” The crunch of snow beneath Nick’s boots announced his return as he followed Nell’s trail through the side yard. “Thank God you’re home. I circled around half the block looking for— Hey!”

As soon as Nick stepped into view, the two-fingered kiss turned sideways and Jordan mimicked the action of shooting a gun.

At Nick.

“Get inside!” Nick warned, reaching beneath his jacket and charging toward the street.

“Jordan!”

Annie shoved open the door, remembering Nick taking aim at the man who’d attacked her. But the Impala’s big engine roared to life and Nell’s boyfriend sped away. “Garza!”

Nick had pulled out his phone, not his gun. He ran out into the street, shouting to the number he’d dialed—traffic patrol, most likely—while Jordan Garza careened around the corner without stopping and raced out of sight.

Annie took in Nell’s white-knuckled grip on the door frame and wondered which player in that thirty-second scenario had scared her more. When Nick turned around and cut a new path straight through the snow to get to his sister, Annie knew
her
answer. “Your brother would never hurt you. If your boyfriend is giving you ultimatums, think about that when you choose whose side you want to be on.”

Nick came up the porch steps two at a time. “Call me when you find him. Fensom out.” Nick disconnected the call and stuffed the phone into his pocket, never breaking stride as he pulled open the storm door and reached for his baby sister. “You okay?”

“You called the cops on Jordan?” Nell burst into tears and scooted inside with the dog, avoiding Nick’s touch. The red door slammed and she charged straight up the stairs, past her parents and siblings who’d heard the shouts and the car and had come to check out the commotion.

Nick threw up his hands. “What did I do? Is she all right?”

“Nothing you can fix.” Nick glanced at her sharply as if that possibility had never occurred to him.

He exchanged a puzzled look with his father, then closed the storm door and picked up his duffel bag. “She was talking to you, wasn’t she? Are you going to explain this to me?”

“I’ll try.” Annie picked up the tub of sweet rolls and started down the stairs, but he quickly caught up and fell into step beside her.

“Am I going to like this explanation?”

“Probably not.”

Chapter Eight

What had been a windy, gloppy, frozen mess for New Year’s Day had settled into a business-as-usual January 2 outside Fourth Precinct headquarters. Road crews were already busy clearing the downtown streets and laying down cinders and salt. Uniformed and civilian personnel on KCPD’s second watch schedule were hunched down inside their coats, catching up on holiday vacations and whining about the weather as they trudged along the sidewalk between tall evergreens whose dark green branches hung low with snow. In addition, several cars and news vans were parked along the curb, hinting that word had leaked out about the Rose Red Rapist’s latest attack. This morning had all the makings of a normal day at work.

But there had been nothing
normal
about this day thus far. Not the early morning social hour at the Fensom house, not the troubling heart-to-heart she’d had with Nell Fensom, and certainly not the conversation she’d shared on the ride to work. In scarcely more than twenty-four hours, she’d learned that Nick Fensom could be annoying, bossy, stubborn, protective, sexy, impulsive, caring and maybe even a little funny. But she’d never have pegged him for the moody, surly man who followed her out the front entrance of the KCPD parking garage.

“Let’s keep moving.” Apparently, if he couldn’t keep his youngest sister safe from a dubious boyfriend, then he intended to double his efforts to protect Annie.

Annie startled at the touch of Nick’s hand on her arm. But she quickly pulled away and hurried over the crosswalk before the steadying strength and distracting heat of even that impersonal contact filled her head with images from last night that were alternately comforting and erotic and oh, so out of place from anything that felt familiar in her day-to-day world.

With Nick following closely on her heels, she turned into the cold north wind and followed the sidewalk up to the gray granite steps leading to the building’s double-glass doors. But not even the sharp air that bit through the layers of wool and cotton she wore could dull the vivid memory of Nick’s kiss, or fool her into thinking he’d gotten over his guilt trip and would give up his pledge to be her shadow anytime soon.

Their late-night visit to the abandoned pay phone had been full of strained silences and terse exchanges. And while she’d taken photos of several different footprints, the phone itself was not only free of fingerprints, but it had also been wiped clean, leaving her without so much as a skin cell to process. Frustration and exhaustion had left her eager to go home and climb into the comfort of her own bed. But once Annie slipped beneath her quilts, she’d lain awake, hypernaturally aware of every sound and movement coming from the other side of her closed bedroom door.

Other than a couple of sleepovers with her ex-fiancé, Adam, she’d lived alone for ten years. Last night she’d had a man, wearing a pair of jeans and nothing more, making himself at home out in her living room. It had been distracting to hear how Nick had tossed and grumbled, trying to find a comfortable position on the sofa. Finally, he’d gone to the kitchen for a glass of milk. Upon his return, she’d smiled when she heard him arguing softly with Reitz over who had claim to the pillows.

But it had been even more unsettling a few minutes later to hear his quiet steps coming down the hallway, stopping outside her bedroom door. She’d closed her eyes and feigned sleep when he silently nudged the door open and stood there, watching over her in the darkness, finally deciding that she was safe enough for him to relax his vigil and get a few hours of shut-eye himself.

This morning, she’d dared to hope that things would return to normal between them. Trade a few quips. Push each other’s buttons. Work together amicably enough while maintaining a professional distance. No kissing, no touching, no illusions that she might actually have feelings for the man. But the incident with Jordan Garza this morning had put the kibosh on that.

Well, at least Nick hadn’t kissed her.

“Hold up,” Nick warned, catching her arm and holding on this time as they reached the double front doors. He peeled off his sunglasses and peered through the glass into the building’s lobby. “Looks like there’s a crowd in there.”

Annie’s breath steamed through her nose. She tugged against his grip, sensing his retreat away from the promise of warmth and a familiar work routine inside the building. “It’s a press conference. Looks like Dr. Kilpatrick cut short her holiday vacation with Sheriff Harrison. She must be briefing them on Rachel Dunbar’s murder.”

Cameras and sound equipment, power cords and spotlights wove through a crowd of twenty or so reporters and their crews. The coolly elegant blonde at the podium pressed her lips together, ending her statement, and a dozen hands shot up. The microphones and cameras drifted forward, then retreated, like the ebb and flow of a human tide as forensic psychologist and fellow task force member Kate Kilpatrick called on one man in the crowd.

Annie took note of a couple of uniformed officers positioned around the lobby, but even their eyes were focused on the woman in the spotlight. The only person not hanging on every word was the tall, uniformed sheriff in a cowboy hat, standing just behind Dr. Kilpatrick. He was watching everyone else in the lobby, his sharp eyes and protective stance needlessly reminding Annie just how dangerous their hunt for the Rose Red Rapist could be. Only a few months earlier a stalker masquerading as the rapist had terrorized Dr. Kilpatrick, a well-spoken woman who also served as the task force’s press liaison.

Boone Harrison, a small-town sheriff who’d originally come to Kansas City to investigate his sister’s murder, had interfered with the task force’s investigation. But he’d wound up being in the right place at the right time to save Dr. Kilpatrick’s life. Although they played down the attraction between them, the sheriff had also become a fixture in Dr. Kilpatrick’s personal life—and judging by his watchful stance, he believed there was still something dangerous out there she needed protection from.

Were Nick’s instincts right, too? Was there something dangerous out there after Annie, as well?

A chill that wasn’t entirely due to the bitter wind raised goose bumps across her skin, indicating there might be more bravado than bravery to Annie’s courage. But she pulled her chin from inside the collar of her coat and reached for the door handle anyway.

“You okay?” Nick’s fingers squeezed her hand and she shivered outright.

“I don’t do really well with big crowds of people.”

“If you can survive my family, you can survive this.” At last, a glimpse of the Nick she knew. “Let’s just get upstairs to the conference room.”

“Right.”

She opened the door and they were greeted by a blast of heat and noise as Kate Kilpatrick finished her answer and the reporters’ hands shot into the air again. Every camera was flashing. Every voice clamored to be heard.

Dr. Kilpatrick pointed to the female reporter with the long dark hair, standing at the front of the group beside a news cameraman. “Ms. Owen?”

The camera’s light brightened, filming Dr. Kilpatrick’s response to the reporter’s question. “Do you believe the Rose Red Rapist’s crimes have escalated to murder? How do you intend to proceed with the investigation without any witness to interrogate?”

“There’s more than eyewitness testimony involved when it comes to solving a crime.” Kate’s evenly modulated voice never wavered, despite the taunt coloring the reporter’s tone. “We look at victimology, suspect profiling, forensic evidence—”

“But there is no forensic evidence from Ms. Dunbar’s murder,” the reporter interrupted. “According to my sources, at any rate. Can you confirm the disappearance of that evidence? That it’s no longer in KCPD’s hands?”

“I’m not sure where your source would have gotten that information.”

“Are you saying there
is
evidence?” the reporter prodded. “What did you find?”

Sheriff Harrison grumbled something and moved up behind Dr. Kilpatrick. But she raised a hand, warning him back to his place without ever taking her eyes off the female reporter. “I can neither confirm nor deny that report at this time. However, our investigation continues to move forward.”

“The people of Kansas City will be glad to hear that.” But there was little praise in the woman’s aggressive tone. “My source also says there was a second attack at the scene of Rachel Dunbar’s murder. Is there evidence from that crime? Can it identify the rapist?”

An undercurrent of softly voiced comments and sidebar conversations increased the noise bouncing off the lobby’s stone walls.

“There was another attack?”

“Who did he hurt?”

“Do you have a name?”

Dr. Kilpatrick leaned into the microphone on the podium and tried to defuse the tension building in the room. “We don’t believe the Rose Red Rapist is responsible for the second attack.”

“But the two crimes are related, right?”

All the questions and comments got lost in the shock buzzing in Annie’s ears. They were talking about
her.
Her voice tightened to a whisper. “How does that woman know I lost the evidence?”

“She doesn’t.” Nick bumped into Annie’s back when she stopped and she stumbled forward. But his hands quickly folded around her shoulders, steadying her, pulling her half a step closer to whisper against her ear. “And you didn’t lose it. It was taken. Forcibly. That reporter’s fishing for information.”

Annie watched the reporters’ curiosity morph into excitement, even panic, as they got wind of the new twist in KCPD’s investigation. “What source is she talking about? Do you think it was that man who called my apartment last night?”

With his hands still on her shoulders, Nick nudged her forward again. “Let Dr. Kilpatrick handle it. I’ve got a bad feeling about this. There are too many people on edge in here.” He shifted his hold and wrapped his hand around Annie’s, moving in front of her to pull her along more quickly. “The stairs are closer. We’ll take those up to the second floor and catch the elevator there.”

“You and your gut.” Annie hurried her short legs to keep up with his. “You know, your internal viscera scares me more than the shadows moving through that alley did.”

“If my internal viscera had been working last night, none of this...” Nick’s gaze darted over the top of Annie’s head and he cursed. “Too late.”

“Too late for what?”

He tapped her cheek, pushing her gaze toward the reporters to see what he’d seen, even as he tightened his grip on her hand and pulled her past the open stairs. “They can follow us there. We need a closed door between us.”

For a split second, Annie’s feet refused to work. One of the television cameramen had pulled his eye away from his screen to watch the man and woman skirting around the edge of the lobby. Without taking his eyes off Annie, he tapped the shoulder of the dark-haired woman with a microphone standing next to him. “You think that’s her?” he asked the reporter. “She looks beat up.”

“Annie. Move.” Nick nearly pulled her off her feet.

Her pulse raced into overtime, fueling her panic and pouring adrenaline into her steps.

The cadre of reporters turned as one, taking note of the couple scurrying to the elevators. Like a shifting flock of birds, all eyes and lights and camera lenses turned their attention toward them.

“Is she another victim?”

“He’s one of those task force cops,” another one confirmed. “I interviewed him for the paper.”

“What about her? She’s been hurt. Who is she?”

Nick punched the elevator’s call button half a dozen times. “Come on.”

Annie squeezed Nick’s free hand between both of hers as the flock changed course and pursued them across the lobby.

“Annabelle Hermann?”

The memory of a man’s breathy voice chilled the blood in her veins and she turned. Did she know that voice? “Who said that?”

She tried to search the approaching crowd, but they were shifting equipment, jostling for position—coming after her.

“CSI Hermann?” The click of high-heels hurried across the lobby, and the noise that followed drowned out any chance of identifying the source of that voice. “You
are
CSI Annabelle Hermann, right?”

“How did you know?” She wasn’t wearing her vest or any other visible ID. Annie scanned the crowd of reporters and concerned citizens, wondering which man had sounded so ominously familiar. But there were so many faces. Too many.

The woman reporter’s stunning, caramel-skinned beauty seemed menacing as she thrust her microphone toward Annie. “You’re on the task force, dear. We know all your names.”

Nick pulled her closer. “I knew it was a bad idea to list us in the paper.”

Suddenly, the lobby was far too hot and way too crowded and Annie longed for the bitter cold and empty sidewalk outside. She trained her ears to the sound of gears locking into place and counterweights lowering the elevator down to the first floor. But that focused hearing also made the barrage of questions assaulting her crystal clear.

“I’m Vanessa Owen, evening news,” the woman introduced herself, putting herself front and center among the gathering group. She snapped her fingers to the tall, dark-haired cameraman beside her. “Damien, are you getting this? Get a shot of her face.”

He nodded. “Got it.”

“Can you tell us what happened?” Vanessa asked. “Were you attacked by the Rose Red Rapist?”

“No.” Annie tugged her stocking cap lower over her forehead and squinted into the light of the television camera. “There was no rose.”

“Then how were you injured? That’s a nasty bruise.”

The natural instinct to answer a question put to her drew the words out of Annie’s stunned thoughts. “I was at the crime scene. Early New Year’s morning.”

Nick pushed her behind him, putting his body between Annie and the thrust of the female reporter’s microphone. “We’re not here to answer questions.”

The reporter ignored his defensive stance and leaned to one side to speak to Annie. “But you were attacked while investigating Rachel Dunbar’s murder?”

“Yes.”

A dozen lights flashed and Annie had to close her eyes.

Clutching the back of Nick’s jacket, she felt, rather than saw, him take a deep breath to form a more imposing barrier. “We’re done here.”