LEFT THE HOSPITAL Sunday afternoon. He didn’t need a specialist to tell him his heart was pumping. Didn’t need anyone to tell him that someone had tried to kill him Friday night, either.
Nothing surprising in that. There were lots of people who’d be glad to see him turn up dead. He just hadn’t expected them to be attending a society function in Courage Bay. He’d have to start watching his back every minute, no longer just when he was on his L.A. turf.
He grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and stepped onto his back deck. The view of the Pacific Ocean was breathtaking, worth every penny of the exorbitant price of the house. More than his mother had made in a lifetime of backbreaking work cleaning other women’s houses.
She’d even died in one, mopping someone else’s dirty floors. The hurt dug into him, felt like a buzzard’s claws piercing his heart. He’d thought if he made enough money, if he insinuated himself into the lives of wealthy people like the ones who’d once hired his mother to clean their houses, he’d vindicate her suffering and eradicate the pain.
One day it might, but it hadn’t happened yet.
He walked across his yard, stepped out the gate of his security fence and headed toward the edge of the steep precipice. Using his hand to shade his eyes from the sun, he looked down at the churning waves beating against the outcropping of jagged rocks.
A flash of heat and pain hit the back of his head. That was the last thing he was aware of as he toppled over the edge of the cliff and plunged to the rocks below.
CHAPTER THREE
IT WAS A HELL OF A TIME for his chief of detectives to be attending a terrorist training session with the CIA in Washington D.C., Max decided as he drove away from the scene of Courage Bay’s latest murder. Not only was Adam Guthrie out of town, but Flint Mauro, his new assistant chief, was still on his honeymoon. Either of them would have been perfect to head up the latest murder investigation.
Who was he kidding? As much as he’d like to have Adam and Flint around to team up with, Max had no intention of taking just a supervisory role with this case. This latest murder might be connected to the Avenger, and that was more than he could stomach.
The Avenger’s days were numbered. It was no idle threat. Not even a warning. It was just plain fact.
The TV newsmen were waiting when Max skidded to a stop in his private parking spot at police headquarters. The whole lot were insatiable vultures, but he didn’t doubt for a second that he’d be just as persistent were he a newsman instead of a cop. He just never understood how bad news traveled so fast.
The cameras started popping the second he stepped out of his car. Someone stuck a microphone in his face.
“Do you think the latest murder is the work of the serial killer known as the Avenger?”
“There’s no conclusive proof of anything at this time.”
“Is it true that Bernie Brusco had connections with organized crime?”
Max kept walking. “No comment at this time.”
“Will you form a serial killer task force?”
Yeah, and he was it. “Bernie Brusco’s murder will be fully investigated using every resource we have.”
“Do you think the killer could be a Courage Bay police officer?”
“It could be anyone,” Max said. “That’s it for now.”
“Will you be holding a press conference?”
“Should ordinary citizens be afraid?”
“Do you have suspects?”
The questions kept flying at him as he ducked inside the building, but he waved them off. The reporters would soon fall away, heading back to their newspaper desks and TV stations with the little they knew. A Sunday afternoon murder in the prestigious neighborhood of Jacaranda Heights would be the lead story in all the media. The Avenger would no doubt get a great deal of satisfaction from the attention.
Max dropped to the chair behind his desk, one of the reporters’ questions sticking in his mind like a gearshift that wouldn’t budge. Did he think the perp could be a cop? Not that the question surprised him. Lawmen were obvious candidates for avenger-type murders. There wasn’t a cop out there who at some point didn’t get sick and tired of putting his or her life on the line while the legal system passed more and more laws to protect the guilty and the justice system kept releasing the criminals and throwing them back on the streets.
Max knew and trusted his force down to a person. Still, knowing the facts about avenger-type killings made his choice clear. He’d go this investigation alone, and he’d be as objective as was humanly possible when it came to evidence. No one, positively no one, would be off-limits as a suspect if the evidence pointed to them. But he was definitely not buying into the mind set that this had to be a cop.
Avenger-type killings took a certain type of individual, one who could plan and carry out an execution with a sense of purpose and duty. One who accepted the role of judge and jury and had no qualms about issuing a death sentence. Historically these killers weren’t coldhearted or evil the way most murderers were.
They weren’t psychopaths, either. If anything, they were usually oversensitive to right and wrong—saw everything in black and white with no shades of gray in the mix. A lot of people with no connection to law enforcement fit that profile.
The sun was setting, and elongated shadows crawled across the room as Max walked into his office and dropped into his chair. He pulled out his notes and started the gruesome task of dissecting every detail that he’d collected at the crime scene. There was very little to go on.
Bernie lived at the highest point of Jacaranda Heights, and had a much steeper drop-off than most of the other residents. Even if the bullet hadn’t killed him, the fall would have.
There had been no exit wound, so it was a safe bet that they’d find the bullet somewhere inside the skull. Forensics would be able to narrow down the type of weapon and possibly an estimate of the distance it had traveled before making contact.
Weary now, Max got up and walked over to the file cabinet, where he pulled the four files of the previous murders. He’d go through them one by one, immerse himself in the facts surrounding each case, review them day and night until some pattern emerged.
No murder was perfect. The evidence was always there. The challenge was in finding and recognizing it.
First file, first murder—Hollywood producer Dylan Deeb. The killer obviously found Deeb’s sexual exploitation of underage actresses repugnant enough to assign Deeb a death sentence.
Max’s cell phone rang. He checked the number on the ID. Callie Baker. He stupidly raked his fingers through his hair as if she could see him, before he cleared his throat and took the call.
“Hello, Callie.”
“Max, I was hoping I could catch you.”
Her words sizzled along his nerve endings, and he wondered how a mere voice could produce that sensation. But then it wasn’t a mere voice. It was Callie’s.
“Is
