Shattered Souls (2 page)

Cait sighed and blotted her body with the towel. If he’d been even the least bit nicer, she might have asked him to join her for old times’ sake. However, she guessed they both needed to hold on tight to their anger or they’d never get through the day.

Anger was the deepest emotion either one of them could risk. Anything else would hurt too damn much.

Exactly four minutes later, Cait slid her shades over her eyes to cut the glare of the sun shining through the sedan’s windshield.

Another hot, muggy day in Memphis—surprise, surprise. She turned the vent in the dashboard to blow cool air over her face. Nausea still rumbled in her stomach. They made a turn, and she straightened in her seat. “Not heading for the station house?”

His jaw tightened. His lips thinned.

“You gonna tell me what’s up? The way you’re acting, I’m wondering why you didn’t just cuff me.”

“Don’t think I wasn’t tempted,” he bit out.

The next turn took them to a row of run-down apartments and seedy hotels blocks away from Beale Street. They pulled into the Blue Suede Inn and halted at the front doors of the hotel. The curving drive-through was filled nose-to-tail with white blue-and-gold-striped squad cars.

“Got an active crime scene?” She perked up and scanned the area. Her instincts had been right; something big had happened, but she still didn’t have a clue why she was here.

He slammed the gearshift into park without responding, turned his head, and glared.

Curious now, she didn’t wait for him to tell her to get out and follow him, while he shrugged into his sports jacket and straightened his tie. Still, he passed through the sliding doors before she caught up. The hotel lobby teemed with cops talking to the staff and guests. Sam and Cait passed the front desk and hooked a right toward the elevators.

Once the doors slid closed, she glanced his way. “Are you gonna tell me why I’m here?” she asked, a chill beginning to work its way down her spine.

“Where were you last night, Cait?” he asked quietly, not looking her way.

Damn, did she need an alibi? Her gaze riveted on the seam of the doors. “I started at O’Malley’s.”

“And after that?”

She shrugged. They both knew she didn’t have a clue. Her drinking had been just one of the problems that had ended their partnership—and their marriage.

The bell chimed on the sixth floor, and the doors slid open. Faint, staticky whispers that usually blended like white noise in her head grew louder.

Cait firmed her jaw and followed Sam through a line of navy-blue uniforms. Heads turned her way. She recognized several of the officers. A couple of them nodded, but none offered a greeting. Something in their grim expressions added to her misgivings.

At the end of the line of uniforms stood Lieutenant Leland Hughes—same pit bull face; a wide, crooked nose; steely gray eyes; deadpan expression; and the beginnings of a comb-over to mask his dark, receding hairline. Both arms were folded over his chest, and his tall, burly body seethed with irritation as he stared.

Girding herself for what was coming, she clamped her jaw tight and raised her chin. She had butted heads with Leland when she’d been one of his detectives in the Homicide Bureau, and he’d nearly drummed her out in disgrace.

His gaze raked her, and then he turned his body toward Sam, dismissing her. “What’s she doin’ here?” he bit out. “You know civilians aren’t allowed at an active crime scene.”

“Lieutenant, I think you know what I want her to hear.”

Leland’s mouth firmed into a thin, straight line. “She causes any problems, it’ll be your ass.”

“Understood.”

The lieutenant gave her one more warning glare and then lifted his chin to the officer guarding the door marked 612. The officer turned the knob and pushed it open.

“I need everyone to clear out,” Sam said as he entered.

Forensics techs were still at work. The smell of alcohol and graphite powder filled the air. Every surface was layered with fingerprint dust. Evidence bags lay stacked in an overfilled carton.

She gave a quick glance around. Spattered blood dotted the wall behind the headboard and across the sheets, but there was no body or taped outline on the floor. A splintered desk chair lay on its side in front of the dresser. The dresser itself sat at an angle, pulled out from the wall and facing away from the door. Drawers and men’s clothing littered the carpet.

When the last tech left the room, taking the carton with him, Sam pulled the door shut, closing them in alone. Once again, his stiff posture and curled fists betrayed his agitation.

Cait drew in a deep breath. “Sam, what’s going on? Why am I here?”

Without responding, he walked to the telephone still sitting on the nightstand, pulled a pen from his pocket, and pressed the button marked
MESSAGES
.

“Henry, just got your message.”

Henry was in Memphis? Cait’s eyes widened, and the blood drained from her face. She shot Sam a glance.

His expression didn’t give away a thing, but his cold, blue stare said he wanted answers.

Cait shivered as she stepped closer to the phone, listening to her own brisk and only slightly slurred voice, agreeing to meet Henry Prudoe in this very room.

Chapter Two

“You don’t remember calling him here last night, do you?” Sam asked evenly.

Cait closed her eyes. Bad move. The floor shifted beneath her feet. “No.” She didn’t remember making the call, didn’t remember if she’d come. She didn’t remember a damn thing past her fourth scotch at O’Malley’s. Par for the course. And why she didn’t work past midnight these days.

The ever-present whispers softened, almost extinguished, and she swallowed, really needing that shot of scotch now. She opened her eyes and met Sam’s flinty gaze.

Disappointment shone in his face. Anger she could have shrugged off, but this was the same look he’d worn through the last days of their marriage. It still cut her to the bone.

“This was Henry’s room?” She lifted her chin because she didn’t want him guessing that shame heated her cheeks.

“He registered yesterday. And we found his wallet on the nightstand.”

“What was he doing here?” Her head pounded, and she fought to pull together her thoughts. “The last time we talked he was in Florida, enjoying his retirement.”

“I hoped you’d be able to answer that.” He drew in a deep breath and ruffled the top of his head with a hand—a clear indication of his frustration. “Have a look around the room. Tell me what you see.”

“Your team’s been all over it. What can I add?”

“Humor me.”

She shrugged casually while a bad, bad feeling crept along her spine. When his expression settled into stubborn lines, she knew he’d just wait her out. So she stood in the center of the floor and visually scanned the room, looking for clues about what had gone down while she fought emotions she didn’t want to acknowledge.

Henry had been her first partner when she’d been a brand-new detective. He’d shown her the ropes, fussing and castigating her every time she’d missed a clue or screwed up something. He’d stayed on her ass until the day he’d handed in his badge and gun, satisfied she’d do just fine without his mentorship.

She’d missed the ornery cuss but hadn’t had a lot of time to mope because Sam had been assigned as her new partner. And, well, suddenly the strict lines she’d drawn between her personal life and work had blurred.
Deliciously.

Now wasn’t the time to reflect. With fists on hips, Sam waited for her to tell him something he didn’t already know. Her gaze went back to the bed. To where everything had started.

Henry had put up one hell of a fight. Her stomach lurched.

“Looks like his attacker surprised him while he slept,” she said, eyeing the spray pattern on the headboard and wall above it. “He must have suffered a head wound. Don’t know how he didn’t go down, as much blood as there is here.” Again, she shivered, wondering how hard combing the room must have been for the team. Everyone had loved Henry.

She glanced at the blood soaked into the brown carpet beside the bed. “He was still fighting. His head hit the comforter here.” She pointed at the rumpled bedding that had been pulled half off the bed. “Then the floor. These stripes,” she said, kneeling beside parallel lines of blood, “he must have been facedown, and the guy was dragging him.” She glanced behind her and stilled. The stripes, like fingertips digging at the carpet, streaked all the way to the dresser. “That’s…weird.”

Cait glanced at Sam and noted the sharpening of his gaze. He had known she’d be struck by the oddness of the direction of the pattern. Whispers grew louder, and she rose.

With slow steps she approached the dresser, noted small, round smudges on the front pieces of several of the scattered drawers. She squatted next to the dresser and peered upward, seeing for the first time the dried ovals just underneath the dresser top. He’d gripped the dresser top, but from what angle? Sweat popped out on her forehead. Her anxiety deepening, she took a deep breath. His bloody fingers had left streaks across the top. Scrapes left by fingernails, mixed with the blood, ended at the glass.

Her glance caught on one more telltale clue, and her stomach tightened. This time, she was afraid she’d add vomit to the gore already present in the room. Cait raked a hand through her tangled hair. She needed to get out of here and let the techs and the detectives figure out what had happened, because she wasn’t ready to complete the trail.

Goddamn, she really needed a drink.

“Don’t stop now,” Sam said, an edge of warning in his softly spoken words.

“I can’t do this,” she said, swallowing hard and dropping her gaze to her hands, which had begun to shake. The whispers that always rose when there was trouble of a spooky persuasion clamored in her head. So loud, so many. She couldn’t distinguish the words, but she understood their warning.

“Henry was your partner,” Sam ground out, his gaze narrowed. “Your mentor. You can’t walk away from this one.”

She snorted and shot him a glare. “You walked away from me.”

“You left me a long time before I moved out.”

Still avoiding his stare, Cait took a deep, quivering breath. She couldn’t think straight.

“I need you on this one, Cait.”

He used “the voice.” The one that made her putty in his hands to mold whichever way he wanted. The one that made her melt, but not because he’d turned on any heat. It was more the ragged, naked texture.

Unless he felt he really needed her, he wouldn’t be asking for her help. She was the last person on the planet he’d ever want to ask. Begging her had to be costing him.

She owed him. Big-time. He’d helped her leave the force with her dignity still intact. Pointed her toward Jason and his agency. In reality, he’d saved her life.

Cait straightened her shoulders, then looked at the handprint on the mirror attached to the dresser’s top. “I don’t get it.” She glanced at the bare, white ceiling. “It’s almost like the killer used a pulley to haul him feetfirst off the floor and drag him up the dresser.”

“Look again, Cait. I know you see it.”

A shudder ran through her. Cait didn’t want to. She averted her face from the glass. From the one bloody outline she knew shouldn’t be where it was. Henry had fought an attacker in this room. He’d fought ferociously. The mussed bedclothes, the shattered furniture, the sprayed blood—all told the story.

But the scene was as if the room had been turned upside down. The streaks led to the dresser, all the way up to the frame surrounding the old mirror.

“The handprint can’t be his,” she whispered. “He was upside down. Lifted somehow. By the feet. But the fingers of the handprint point upward. Your techs, can they get a clear print?”

“Look again, Cait,” Sam repeated.

The sharper edge to his voice told her he’d keep her there until she faced it.

Cait swallowed and forced her gaze to rest on the handprint. Dark brown, and it glistened. As though frozen.

Again…weird. The print wasn’t raised but appeared flat. Frowning, she glanced back to see if it was OK for her to touch. Sam gave her a nod, and she leaned closer to touch the glass. Her finger slid along the smooth, clean surface.

How—?
She jerked back her hand and rubbed it on her hip.

“You see why I needed you?”

She didn’t bother looking back. “You don’t believe in this shit.”

“I’m skeptical,” he said, his gaze meeting hers in the mirror. “But explain how a bloody goddamn handprint is on the inside of the glass.”

With a shake of her head, she backed away from the dresser. “I can’t. Waste of time bringing me here.”

Sam caught her shoulders from behind. “All those times you asked me to trust your gut,” he whispered harshly beside her ear. “Prove there’s something to it. That you weren’t just losing it to the booze.”

Her face began to crumple, and then she tightened her expression and shrugged out of his grasp. As far as Sam Pierce was concerned, she was all cried out. But she might feel satisfied to let him take a walk in her shoes. Just for a day or two. Long enough to find out who…or what…had taken Henry.