cleared his throat.
Marty spun and faced him. The woman beside him turned more slowly. When she saw who was standing there, her lips curled up on the sides in a devilish smile. “Ah, our detective has arrived.”
Cal’s eyes narrowed. He couldn’t remember meeting this woman, but there was something familiar about her. “I’m sorry, I haven’t had the pleasure.” He stuck out his hand. “Cal Black.”
When she took his hand, an odd burst of heat streamed from her hand to his, shooting like an adrenaline burst up his arm and into his chest.
He pulled his hand back quicker than normal, his palm still tingling. “And you are?”
“Brigid.” Her smile grew wider.
Marty clapped Brigid on the back. “Brigid is one of the team.”
“How long have you been on the force?”
“Counting today?” She checked her watch. “Approximately four hours.”
Cal’s gaze shot from her to Marty.
Marty sighed. “It’s a long story, but suffice it to say, she’s been working with the Chicago Police Department for almost a year and demonstrated her…uh…expertise. Mostly with arson investigations, but we have reason to believe she could be of assistance on this team.”
Cal frowned. “Does she understand the risks of working on the Chicago police force?”
Brigid crossed her arms over her chest, her black leather vest creaking, the black nail polish on her fingertips shining. “I can take care of myself, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Do you have a license to carry a weapon?”
“No.”
“Do you even know how to shoot?”
“No.” She glanced at Marty.
“She’s not a trained police officer, Cal.” Marty grinned. “But she has talents that could come in handy on this case and others we’ve seen like it.”
Not until she stared up at him, forcing him to look directly into her eyes, did he realize how intensely blue hers were.
Cal nodded, not entirely sold on Brigid’s so-called talents, but willing to give the lieutenant the benefit of the doubt. “Maybe you can explain to me what exactly the Special Investigations Team does?”
“Yeah.” Brigid sat on the conference table and crossed her legs Indian fashion. “Tell him what we’re up against.”
“That’s just it.” Marty shook his head. “We don’t know what we’re up against. We’ve taken a select few of Chicago’s finest from the police force and a couple detectives like you and a few trusted civilians we’ve worked with in the past…”
Brigid shot a frown at the lieutenant.
The man’s lips twisted. “Okay, one trusted civilian…to form this team.”
Brigid’s frown smoothed.
The lieutenant stared hard into Cal’s eyes. “We get all the cases no one knows what to do with, the ones that don’t make sense, and we try to make sense out of them.”
Brigid snorted in a very unladylike manner, yet in keeping with the black leather, bad-ass persona she’d adopted. “What the lieutenant is trying to say, but isn’t quite nailing, is that we will be investigating the cases involving paranormal activities. Incidents that defy the norm. The quirky, weird, bizarre, uncanny and downright strange occurrences that usually get shoved under the radar because they make people feel too uncomfortable to address.”
“What are you talking about? I thought I was investigating the disappearance of a girl.” Cal reminded himself this girl wasn’t just any girl. She was his ex-girlfriend’s sister.
“And you are,” Marty assured him. “First and foremost, we want to retrieve the missing girl and reunite her with her family.” The lieutenant stared over at Brigid. “While I have both of you here alone, I need to know something.”
“Know what?” Cal demanded.
“I need to know that your connections with the victim’s family members will not get in your way of performing a thorough investigation.”
“What connection?” Cal’s heart beat faster, but he played dumb to the lieutenant’s question. What did Marty know about his relationship with Deme Chattox?
The lieutenant shook his head. “We conduct a thorough investigation of all our team members, security check, background check down to what vet you take your dog to.”
“I don’t have a dog,” Cal stated flatly.
“Well, we knew you had a thing going with Deme Chattox, the victim’s oldest sister.”
Brigid’s eyes narrowed. “Were you doing my sister? Tsk, tsk. And here I thought we’d have a shot at making things happen.”
“Sister?” Cal glanced from Brigid back to Marty. “What do you mean, sister?”
“Our missing girl, Aurai Chattox, has four sisters.”
Brigid gave him a little wave with the tips of her fingers. “Brigid Chattox, Deme’s younger sister. She didn’t tell you about us, did she?” She tapped her chin with her fingertip. “I wonder why.”
Cal wondered, too. Seems like when you’re sleeping with someone, they’d tell you all their secrets. Family shouldn’t be a secret. But not Deme. From the get-go, their passion singed any other thoughts from his head. When he finally got around to asking, she’d gone. Completely out of his life. There one day, gone the next.
“One of the reasons I brought you in on this case was because I knew you had dealings with Deme Chattox and probably knew a little about her and her family. When Brigid told me what the Chattox sisters had planned, I knew I needed one of Chicago’s best detectives on the inside.”
Brigid shook her head, her lips twisting. “He didn’t trust us to do it on our own.”
“Damn it, Brigid!” Marty pounded his fist on the conference table so hard, even the ubercalm Brigid bounced, her eyes widening.
Marty’s lips pressed into a thin line, his face beetred and getting redder by the second. “We’ve already lost one young woman to whoever or whatever kidnapped her. I don’t want to lose four more.”
Brigid uncurled her legs and pushed off the table, standing tall. “She’s not gone for good. We just can’t find her.” Her jaw tightened. “But we will, I have no doubt. I only told you because I wasn’t going to refuse a little help.”
“And rightfully so. A missing girl on a campus is not something to take lightly. The police need to be just as involved in returning the girl to her family as bringing the perpetrator to justice.” He aimed the remarks at Brigid, then he turned to face Cal. “Back to my original question. Is your relationship with Deme Chattox going to cause you any difficulties?”
