Dead Wrong Read online

  “She too upset to talk?”

  “Nah, it’s me. I kinda blew up at her.” No surprise, there. Tommy’s Irish temper often got in the way. “When I saw what the creep did to her, I lectured her about going in without backup.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “I know. I know.” He held up his hands. “We both would’ve done the same thing, and I had no business yelling at her.” They were taught to protect life at all costs and sometimes that meant risking your own. “But man, he could’ve killed her. And I—” He shrugged.

  “You lost it.”

  “Yeah, and now she’s upset with me on top of everything else. So can you talk to her? You know, help her deal?”

  Not at all what Mitch expected him to say, not with his history with Kat.

  “Can’t you call her family to help?”

  “Trust me. The last thing Kat would want is for me to call them. She’s too independent for that.”

  Mitch knew Tommy was right, but that still didn’t make Mitch the best one to help. “You know I’m not the right choice for this.”

  Tommy raised a brow. “What? You talking about the way you brushed her off? That was a long time ago. I’m not sure she even remembers it.”

  Mitch wasn’t as certain. When the medic headed for her rig, he looked at Kat, hoping to judge her mood.

  Sitting with her legs pulled up tight in the circle of her arms and her head resting on her knees, she met his gaze. Anguish flowed from her expressive eyes. Her nose had stopped bleeding but was already swelling. Probably broken.

  “Look at her, man,” Tommy said as she lifted an ice pack to her face. “How can you say no?”

  She shivered and stared into the night, her eyes vacant and full of pain. Mitch hadn’t seen her for two years, maybe longer. Not since her adoptive parents’ funeral. They were murdered in a robbery gone wrong. Her adoptive father was a former police officer so all the rank and file had shown up to pay their respects.

  He’d watched her that day, unable to take his eyes off her as she stood in her dress blues for the very last time in her career. Perfect posture keeping her back stiff, shoulders high, arms at her side. Looking strong and in control. Until he caught sight of the raw pain in her eyes and his heart turned over and broke for her.

  But now? Now he didn’t know what he was feeling and that scared him more than he’d like to admit. But he just couldn’t walk away.

  “Fine. I’ll do it,” he said. “But I’m not to blame if it upsets her even more.”

  “Just handle her with kid gloves and you’ll be fine.”

  Mitch headed for the house. Kid gloves, right. How was he supposed to do that when each step gave him a better look at how this creep had beaten her up, making him madder than he’d been in years?

  He fisted his hand. He had to keep things professional. Do his job. Encourage her to recount her horrifying experience. Then help her deal and do everything within his power to catch the killer before he came back to finish the job.

  TWO

  Kat couldn’t get her heart rate to slow, and the thunderous look on Mitch Elliot’s face as he strode up the walk didn’t do anything to help. She should look away from the man who’d once rejected her, but she couldn’t take her eyes off him.

  Over six feet, and dark, he looked dangerous coming out of the mist. Not dangerous like the suspect, but dangerous like a man who refused to be ignored. He always managed to get to her in a way that tested her decision to steer clear of relationships.

  The wind gusted, ballooning out his jacket and blowing tiny needles of rain in her face. She shivered, a tremor starting at her neck and working down her body.

  Mitch stopped in front of her and, without a word, he shrugged out of his windbreaker and handed it to her. As the jacket dangled from his finger, she thought to refuse it, but another shiver had her sliding her arms into the sleeves and feeling the gray flannel lining laced with his musky scent resting soft against her neck.

  He took a deep breath and squatted in front of her. Closer than she’d like, he didn’t make eye contact. Instead, he stared beyond her—maybe at the door or at the officer standing watch. He needed a shave and in this hazy light, he looked more like a bad boy than a homicide detective.

  “You give anyone your statement?” he finally asked, still not looking at her.

  “Not formally.” She looked at her hands, remembering how she’d clawed the killer. “I scratched the suspect and the tech scraped my nails for evidence, but otherwise Tommy’s kept me out here.”

  Despite the warmth of his jacket and the scent of his cologne clinging to the fabric, she shuddered again, and that seemed to bring his assessing, steel-blue eyes her way. “You’re in shock, Kat.”

  “Huh?”

  “Shock. That’s why you’re shivering.”

  “I’m fine. I just need a moment.” Intending to talk with Tommy—maybe escape the piercing eyes that seemed to cut to her core—she rose. Her vision blurred on the edges, and she swayed.

  Mitch shot up and clamped his hand around her elbow. “Easy, Kat.”

  She shook it off and used the column for support, but waves of dizziness continued to assault her. She never fainted. Never. Not at gory accident scenes. Not at homicides. So why now? Why here in front of all these law enforcement professionals?

  She didn’t want to seem like a rookie, falling down at the sight of a body, so she sat down, before dropping into Mitch’s arms embarrassed her more. She lowered her head between her knees and gulped air.

  She felt him sit next to her, the warmth of his leg settling into her chilled skin. He took a deep breath before exhaling loudly, and she wanted to turn to him and let him hold her. To make this all go away for just a moment in the circle of his arms. But she wouldn’t turn to the man she’d once had a huge crush on.

  A rookie crush like all the female recruits wanting him for their training officer.

  Never happened. Not for her or for the other women. The captain must have seen them all swooning over those amazing blue eyes and only assigned male recruits to Mitch.

  Her crush ended, but not before she’d let him know of her interest, and he’d firmly rejected her. Now here he was, sitting next to her, and she needed to start acting like the professional she was and not some woman he cast aside—or worse, a victim.

  Father, I know what I’m going through is nothing compared to the loss of Nancy, but please help me get through this. Help me stay strong, do what I’m trained to do and find her killer.

  She lifted her head and waited for the world to right itself.

  “Better?” He watched her with his trademark stare. One eye narrowed, his mouth lifting a bit on the same side, the other eye dark and deadly intense.

  She nodded.

  “Good. How about telling me what happened?” He pulled a small notebook from his pocket, his gaze saying this was all business for him.

  All business...and the fact that it bothered her made her even more upset. “Nancy called me. She’s an old friend from college and a client of our agency.”

  “And Nancy’s the deceased?”

  She flinched at the clinical terminology. “Yes. Nancy Bodig.”

  He jotted her name on his pad. “Go on.”

  “Her twin brother, Nathan, died two months ago when his car plunged into a ravine. It was deemed an accident, and she didn’t question the ruling until last week.”

  “What made her change her mind?”

  “She kept Nathan’s cell phone active so she could call his voice mail. You know, just to hear his voice every now and then. But the last time she called, a man answered.”

  Mitch’s eyebrow rose. “And she thinks this means his death wasn’t accidental?”

  “Sort of,” Kat answered, knowing how lame it sounded. “He never went anywhere without his phone but the investigating officers didn’t find it at the accident scene.”

  “That doesn’t mean he was murdered. The phone could’ve been stolen or misplaced. Even
lost in the crash area. Then someone found it and decided to use it.” He sounded so detached—professional like a cop should be.

  Now she knew how it felt to be on the other side. To be a victim. All she wanted to do was mourn the loss of a friend. Instead, she had to recount how she’d failed Nancy. It was almost too hard to go on. But if she didn’t, this killer would never be caught.

  She took a deep breath. “The state police said the same thing when Nancy approached them. I even told her that when she first came to see me.”

  “But?” He waited, pen poised over his notebook.

  “But then she told me she checked his online phone records. There were no outgoing calls and there was only that one incoming call after his death. Since then, I’ve monitored the account. Nothing.”

  “Maybe the phone company made some sort of mistake routing that call.”

  “I checked into that, too. Trust me, I checked everything I could about that phone. It all points to someone possessing Nathan’s phone. But not for regular use. So why keep it? Why answer only on that one day?”

  “Good questions, I suppose.”

  “That’s why I took her case and agreed to find out who had it.” She shook her head. The truth of her failure was about to come to light, and she waited until she’d stemmed off another round of tears. “I didn’t think she was right about the murder, but after tonight—” Her voice broke, and she couldn’t finish her thought, but simply stared down at the mossy sidewalk in front of her. The sidewalk she’d run up not an hour ago and found Nancy’s lifeless body.

  She felt as if she might lose it. Really lose it like she did the night her birth father killed her mother right in front of her. She was only eleven. A child. Watching the man who’d beat her mother time after time, finally going too far. Her mother, after years of letting a man control her every move, lying there. Lifeless.

  The pain swamped her as another wave of grief rose up over her adopted parents who were gunned down in a robbery just a few years ago. Another senseless loss and a reminder of all the horrible things that had happened in her life before they’d rescued her.

  “You’re certain tonight is related to the brother’s death?” Mitch asked, his gentle tone pulling her head back up. His eyes were soft and warm. He understood the pain of what he was asking her to do and he was urging her to go on.

  She let his warmth chase away the horrible sights and smells of violence and focused straight ahead. “The killer said Nancy shouldn’t have involved a private investigator in this and that it was her fault he had to kill me. He knew my name and it sounded almost like he had Nancy lure me here to kill me, too.”

  “Back up.” His voice turned sharp. “You didn’t say anything about luring you.”

  “Like I said in my message, Nancy called and said a guy followed her home. She thought it had to do with Nathan’s death. When I got here, she was already dead and the creep was waiting for me. He told me it was good that he could clean up both of Nancy’s messes at one time.”

  He winced as if the memory of finding her didn’t sit well with him. “So you think our suspect forced her to call you so you’d come over?”

  “Maybe... It sounds farfetched when you say it, but after what happened here, I honestly don’t know.” She drew in a deep breath before going on. “Also Nancy was supposed to call 911. So why didn’t she?”

  “Maybe he overpowered her before she could dial.”

  “Or she didn’t make the call because he was standing next to her forcing her to call me.”

  “At this stage in the investigation, anything’s possible,” he answered just like a good cop would. They were taught to look beyond the obvious. Not form an opinion early on or it might cloud their judgment. And never, never rush to a conclusion.

  “So how about the suspect?” he asked. “I got a good look at his build and saw he wore a mask. Is there anything you can add to help ID him?”

  She thought about it. About him. About anything that could help, but even though it seemed to go on forever as he’d held her on the floor his angry eyes seething at her, now it flashed by in a blurred memory, and she couldn’t come up with much.

  “Nothing, other than he was strong,” she said. “Crazy strong. He tried to inject me, and it took everything I had to fight him off until you got here.” She looked at her wrists, red and irritated from the tape, and could still feel the creep binding her hands and pressing her face into the cold floor. “He thinks I know something about Nathan’s death. Except I don’t have a clue why Nathan or Nancy were killed.” She forced nonchalance into her tone that she didn’t feel even as a swift shiver confirmed her fear.

  Mitch leaned over and tugged the jacket closed but didn’t let go and looked deep into her eyes. “We need to get you out of here.”

  “I want to stay to make sure Nancy’s treated right.” She took a deep breath and forced away more tears.

  “We’re all professionals here, Kat. She’ll be handled with dignity.” He let go of the jacket and stood, offering a hand on the way up.

  He was right. Nancy didn’t need her now. She’d needed her earlier. Before a man murdered her and Kat failed her.

  She took Mitch’s hand and swayed again. He put his other hand under her elbow. She wanted to shake it off and be strong—be like the police officer she used to be where nothing made her feel so lost and dead inside. But she couldn’t find the resolve to do so and wasn’t sure she ever would again.

  * * *

  Mitch pushed open the front door to Kat’s town house and stood back to let her enter. She slipped past him, went to the kitchen adjoining a two-story family room with soaring windows and dropped her keys on the laminate counter.

  He shouldn’t be here. Not in her home with her personal things all around, making him think of her as a person and not a victim in one of his cases. His first instinct had been to have a patrol officer take her home, but he’d told Tommy he’d try to help her cope. Plus he wanted to check out her house to make sure their suspect hadn’t decided to come here to finish what he’d started.

  And maybe, if he stopped to admit it, something in his gut said she needed him. Not some unknown officer, but him. Mitch Elliot.

  He hadn’t felt needed in years. Avoided it, actually, ever since his partner, Lori, was gunned down in front of him. Sure, he took a bullet himself that day, but he’d lived. She hadn’t.

  He felt the scar on his neck, the raised reminder of how fast someone he loved could be taken from him and why he was better off going it alone in life. No matter how good it felt to discover he could connect again with a woman like Kat, he’d never risk another loss.

  She turned and big, haunted eyes stared at him. His gut squeezed like a vise, but his fingers still resting on the scar kept his mind on business.

  “Thanks for bringing me home,” she said. “And I haven’t thanked you for your help at Nancy’s house. If you hadn’t come along—” Another violent shudder wracked her body.

  “You’re welcome.” He felt as if he should say more but opted not to dwell on what could’ve been.

  He closed the door and took in the apartment’s white walls and dull beige carpet. Moving boxes lined the far wall and minimal furniture filled the small living space. Fire had destroyed her house last year when a drug dealer tried to burn out the woman she was protecting. This place was so not Kat. Her walls would radiate color. Bright, bold color.

  “So when will your house be done?” he asked, wiping his feet on the small mat by the door.

  “How do you know about my house?” She bit her lip, but her gaze never waivered.

  “Tommy’s my partner, remember?”

  “Right.” She frowned and tugged the jacket tighter.

  But a tug of a jacket wouldn’t keep him out of her business. Partners shared a lot—were like old married couples in so many ways—and he knew all about Kat’s life. More than she’d likely want the man who’d once rejected her to know.

  The sooner he did his check
and got out of there, the better for both of them. “I’ll do a quick walk-through of the house then take off so you can rest.”

  “You think he came here?” Her voice rose in alarm.

  “Nah,” he said, to calm the renewed fear sparking in her eyes. “But it’d be a good idea to make sure. You stay here.”

  He didn’t wait for her agreement but went down the hall. He checked each room, each window, to be sure the locks were secured and the blinds closed. As he headed back to the family room, his cell rang, making him jump.

  “What’s up, Tommy?” he answered, passing by the kitchen and seeing Kat making coffee.

  “Suspect got away.”

  Mitch huffed out a disgusted breath and started up the stairs. “What happened?”

  “Does it really matter? He’s gone.”

  “Then it’s up to us to bring him in.” Mitch tried to sound optimistic but until he knew if the scene provided any strong leads, he couldn’t really be so sure they’d catch him.

  “You get Kat home all right?”

  “Yeah.” He glanced at her one more time before making the turn on the landing.

  “She doing okay?”

  “Not really. I’m clearing the house right now, but when I finish, I’ll insist she call someone to spend the night with her. Maybe her sister or one of her brothers.”

  Thanks to Tommy’s nonstop chatter, Mitch knew all about the Justice family. Kat had three brothers and one sister. All of them were adopted. And all of them were former law enforcement officers who gave up their careers to find their adoptive parents’ killer. Now they continued to work together in a private investigation agency. No one better to care for her than her siblings.

  Keep telling yourself that and maybe you can go home without a backward glance.

  “Kat will never go for it,” Tommy said.

  “I thought you said they were all tight.”