A couple of detectives walked past his desk, both of their faces buried in the same manila folder. When Cory scratched his cheek, his fingers sank into a full-grown beard. His hair felt too long, and when he looked at his pant legs, he saw a couple of small stains he’d missed when getting dressed a couple of hours before. He could smell stale sweat, and his palms felt slick to the touch.

  What had Warick told the other detectives? Had she even mentioned anything? Just because they had been looking at him strangely when he’d arrived didn’t mean they knew about his meltdown at Ashwell’s office. Shit, they were probably just disgusted by his appearance and continuously rapid decline.

  Cory continued to spin the USB in his hand. As he did, he looked at Bradley’s desk. For the first time since he’d partnered with Swanson, the surface of it was clean. In fact, it was bare. He hadn’t been at the office when they’d cleared it, and Cory supposed that was for the best. He wasn’t sure how he would have reacted to seeing it happen.

  You probably would have flipped out, Cory. That seems to be your go-to reaction lately, right?

  “Probably,” Cory muttered.

  A young detective with blonde hair tied back in a no-nonsense ponytail looked up from her desk, and Cory glared at her. She quickly dropped her gaze and returned to whatever she had been doing.

  Ashwell had seemed determined to pin him to the homicides. Well, that was probably a little unfair, but she had been very pushy on the subject. Although, hadn’t Cory been trying to eliminate that connection ever since he saw Eric Briar’s body in the middle of the baseball field? Sure he had, but trying to cross off a connotation and placing him at the scene of the crimes were two very different things.

  She was just trying to help you realize you couldn’t have had anything to do with it, pal. You’re the one who flew off the handle and presumed the worst.

  Cory shook his head. It hadn’t felt like that at all, and there had been anger in her voice when he’d refused to be hypnotized; he had caught that without a doubt. He knew people’s tones, and he was trained in how to read them. Dr. Ashwell had been trying to shepherd him toward something, although what it was exactly, Cory couldn’t be sure.

  Across the office, Warwick’s door opened with a clatter, and she stepped out. Cory could only see her shoulders and head from where he sat, and he watched as she scanned the room, then took off toward the main door. In a moment, she disappeared out through it, and Cory let out a sigh of relief. He was in no fit state to deal with her, and if she confronted him about what happened at Ashwell’s office, he’d have no defense.

  The main doors parted again, and Medea Bishop strolled in. As she cut through the rows of desks and spatterings of detectives, Cory saw she had a file in her hand. Her tanned legs were on show from the knee down, and above them, a cream skirt and white shirt popped against her flawless tan. Seeing her looking so amazing made Cory feel even more self-conscious about his own shabby condition.

  When she was next to his desk, she looked down and smiled. “How are you today, Detective?”

  “I feel better than I look,” Cory said, slipping the USB into his pocket.

  “Shit!” Medea exclaimed. “I should hope so.”

  “What do you have for me?” he asked, dreading the answer.

  “We got a print off Tim Maguire’s collar,” she chimed, surprising him with such rare good news.

  “Really? I thought Forensics had done a clean sweep already.”

  “We had,” Medea shrugged. “But I ordered a second examination.” She looked over her slender shoulder and scanned the office. Then she turned back. “Warick is non-stop with this case.”

  “You’re telling me,” Cory growled. He nodded at the file in her hand. “That for me?”

  “No, sorry,” she replied. “Just some busywork from a separate case.”

  “When will we get a match on the print?”

  “Hopefully tomorrow. Day after is more likely though,” Medea said. “We sent it to the Bureau.”

  Special cases were often sent to the FBI offices in Portland, but Cory had rarely if ever seen it done for a perceived regular civilian such as Eric Briar. Granted, the kid’s old man was wealthy, and Tony Briar and Warick seemed to have some past connection, but still…

  “FBI labs, really?” Cory asked.

  “I know, right?”

  “Warick is balls deep in this case,” Cory said, more to himself than anyone. Regardless, Medea laughed. It was a beautiful sound that somehow lightened a shitty situation.

  “Don’t let her hear you saying that!”

  Cory looked back up into Medea’s big, brown eyes. “I don’t think it will make much difference at this stage.”

  “I’m sorry if I upset you the other day,” Medea said. The sudden change in subject surprised him.

  “What?” Cory asked.

  “At Bradley’s funeral,” Medea whispered, looking at the floor. “I was just trying to comfort you, and it came out wrong.”

  “I, uh,” Cory stuttered. He had no idea what she was talking about, and he didn’t want to ask her. If what she had said upset him again, who knew how he would react? Also, he was reeling from just being informed that he might have missed another chunk of a day without knowing anything about it. “It’s not a problem.”

  “You were just so upset,” she continued. Cory wished she would drop it so he’d have time to think.

  It was perfectly reasonable to have forgotten some of the things that had been said to him at Bradley’s funeral, right? Of course it was. Brad had been his best friend, so it was only natural that Cory had been in a bit of a state throughout it all. But he could remember Shaw talking to him, couldn’t he? Hell, he could even recall the smell of booze off his breath and the way he’d counted down from three before they lifted the coffin.

  Cory thought about admitting that he had been a bit out of it and then asking Medea to explain, but he’d shown enough weakness over the previous few weeks to last him a lifetime. Instead, he smiled and said, “Seriously, forget about it. I already have.”

  “I bet,” Medea replied.

  “What?”

  “I just mean it must be tough for you, you know?”

  Cory’s eyes turned to slits as he scanned her. Medea seemed unperturbed by it and only stood over him with the manila folder in her hand. As always, he found himself being impressed by the way she carried herself. Medea Bishop was one of the tough ones, and he would have wagered any amount of dough that she would outlast many of her colleagues on the force.

  That’s how you used to come across, Cory, his mind said. And look at you now!

  “Well,” Medea declared, looking at her watch. “I really should get back to it.”

  “Right,” Cory replied. He moved some things around on his desk that didn’t need moving. “Me too.”

  She nodded at him one last time and turned away. Cory watched her rock-hard ass as she shimmied through the traffic of suits and desks. Even though he appreciated her beauty, he felt nothing stirring inside him. At least, not the way it had when he’d first met her. He knew it was only down to how depressed he had become, but it still surprised him. Throughout everything that had been happening, being in the presence of Medea Bishop had been the only crack of light he’d been able to focus on in the heavy, suffocating darkness.

  It was probably for the best that he was going completely numb. Even if he solved the serial killer case, his life as he’d known it was fucked. How could he ever go back to being a respected part of the Investigations Division after the way he had been carrying himself? He was undoubtedly a laughing stock around the coffee machine already, and once that happened, a man could never really bounce back from it. Not fully.

  Cory supposed he could always move to another city and start again. The idea held a certain appeal, but he was smart enough to know that the demons he would be trying to escape all took up residence in his head. Anywhere he went, they’d simply have a snooze while he made all the arrangements and then come back out to play the moment he had unpacked.

  Seeing a shrink had been the final roll of the dice for him, he knew, and that had gone exactly how he’d expected it. Dr. Ashwell had been a fraud, and all she’d wanted to do was talk about shit that didn’t matter. Cory suddenly remembered that he’d meant to confront Medea about her recommendation, but at that moment, he was glad he hadn’t. It would have achieved nothing, and for all he knew, the shrink in question might have helped Medea through some sort of trauma in the past. Just because it had been a waste of time for him didn’t mean it hadn’t worked for her.

  What made everything worse was that there was a big part of Cory that knew some of the stuff the doctor said had been legitimate. He did have to deal with Joshua’s death, and he had pushed it all down inside himself. Bradley had told him the exact same thing before he’d died, and even Medea had hinted at it once before. The only person who seemed reluctant to admit it was Cory himself, and that was simply because he and his twin had never been very close.

  How could he be so devastated by the death of someone he hadn’t even hugged since they were kids? That had always been the big one for him, and it was one of the main reasons he had continued to struggle with the gaping hole in his soul that Joshua had left behind when he’d stepped off the cliff at Mount Hood. Why was there so much pain and unanswered questions regarding someone who had never been a real part of his life?

  People presumed they were close just because they were related, but there had been brothers and sisters since the beginning of time who had spent their entire lives with nothing in common. When Cory added into the mix the constant interference of their father and his endless need to pit them against each other, he ended up with two young men who just happened to share the same last name. That was all that had remained in their souks by the time Duke Van Doren passed away.

  “Fuck it,” Cory whispered, sitting forward. He had work to do, and sitting at his desk pondering the past was pointless.

  Medea had found a fingerprint, which was massive progress in the case. If they got a match, then suddenly the ball was well and truly in their court.

  Are you sure you want to get a match? his subconscious sneered.

  Cory slammed one of his desk drawers shut and stood up. His jacket was on the back of his chair, and he slipped it on over his creased shirt. When he checked his phone, he saw it wasn’t yet 10:00 in the morning. There was plenty of the day left to do some real police work, and he planned on doing just that.

  Before he began, he pulled up Medea’s number and sent a text: Bring those fingerprint results to me before anyone else. Then he hit send.

  He wasn’t going to let anything get in the way of catching the killer anymore. It was his case, and he was sick and tired of people interfering. Besides, he was one of the best detectives in Portland, so if anyone were going to solve it, it would be him.

  Cory was putting his phone back in his pocket when the one on his desk rang. He could see by the little red light on the top of the row that it was the front desk.

  “What’s up, Tina?” he said, clutching the receiver between his ear and shoulder as he reached across the desk for his keys.

  “You gotta get out to Mulberry,” she said, and his heart sank. “We got a break-in and a missing person.”

  Chapter 3

  R

  ohana Ashwell’s office had been trashed. Cory could see the couch he had lain on the previous day on its side, and the chair where she had sat during their sessions looked like it had been hurled against the far wall. One of the legs was snapped off, and Cory had yet to spot it among the carnage. Ashwell’s desk had been emptied, and most of the files and printouts were scattered all over the floor. Thankfully, no blood spatters had been located, so there was a good chance she was still alive.

  Marcus Wardle, one of the junior detectives who had ridden out with him, was tentatively sifting through the debris. Cory had thought about calling Forensics in, but they could wait. For one thing, they had no body, and even though the place had been turned over, there was no evidence to suggest Ashwell hadn’t done it herself. That seemed like a long shot, Cory knew, but professional people had breakdowns all the time. Maybe Ashwell had decided she’d had enough of her buttoned-down life and simply taken it out on her office.

  Clutching at straws, Cory, that ever-intrusive voice said. Maybe you were sleepwalking again last night? She had pissed you off, right?

  “Be careful with that!” Cory barked, as the young detective with the slicked-back black hair clumsily tossed a file back on the ground. “Everything needs to be as it was when we came in.”

  Wardle looked at him with a half-grin, and Cory had to resist the urge to slam a fist into his smug face. At least the little prick had bothered to put gloves on.

  Cory turned to the shaken young woman beside him. Vera O’Neill had been Rohana Ashwell’s assistant for three years, she had told him. She’d let herself into the house that morning to find her employer missing. After seeing the office in such a state, she’d called 911 and reported it. As she waited, she checked the rest of the other rooms and found nothing out of place. Cory had done the same not long after arriving.

  In the bedroom, he’d discovered all of Ashwell’s clothes were still on hangers in the closet, and he’d spotted an empty suitcase gathering dust under the bed. Any thoughts that she might have skipped town looked slim, and when he’d found her purse on the kitchen table with all of her credit cards inside, he’d been certain. Her phone had yet to be uncovered though, and when he dialed her number, it went straight to voicemail.

  “I’ll need to get into her computer,” Cory said, nodding at the laptop on the desk. Thankfully it looked like it was still intact.

  “I can’t do that,” Vera croaked. She looked to be in her late twenties. Her face was plain, and she was dressed in a dowdy skirt and a floral cardigan. “That’s her private computer.”

  “And this is police business, Vera,” Cory said, trying not to let the growing frustration he felt come through in his voice. “Every second counts, and if there is something on there that will help us solve this thing, then I need to see it now.”

  “But I don’t even know the password,” Vera whispered.

  “Shit!” Cory snapped, and she flinched. Wardle looked up from his work, and Cory scowled at him, making him audibly swallow before dropping his eyes. Cory turned to Vera again. “Sorry, that was unprofessional.”

  Vera tried to smile. Cory put his hands on his hips, and he saw Vera glance at the Glock in the shoulder holster beneath his open jacket. America was a gun-crazy nation, but not everyone was comfortable around them. He saw how she seemed to shrink at the sight of it and knew she was one of the latter.

  “Listen,” Cory said, lowering his voice. “Do you have access to the security camera footage?” He nodded to the hall and the front door beyond. He’d seen a small camera in the corner of the porch before and prayed it was operational, as people often only kept them for show. “If someone broke in, we’ll be able to see who it was.”

  Vera’s face lit up. “I do! I do! It is linked to my computer too!”

  “Great,” Cory said. “Where is it?”

  “In the other office. Let me show you.”

  Vera stepped through the sheets of paper and shards of a vase on the floor with surprising ease. Cory followed behind, telling Wardle over his shoulder to keep looking for anything that stood out. The cocky junior detective mumbled something close to a respectful reply, and Cory ignored the smarminess in his voice. He could tear him a new asshole regarding his attitude at a later date.

  As they walked down the hallway, Cory realized he hadn’t seen another office when he’d scoured the house earlier. In fact, he’d never even considered there might be two, never mind the possibility of Ashwell having an assistant. He supposed it was simply because the doctor ran her practice out of her home that he had never envisioned anyone else working there.

  Vera led him through the kitchen into a glass conservatory out back. It had started to drizzle since he’d arrived, and he could hear it pattering against the glass roof. Cory had looked into the room briefly in his earlier search and quickly dismissed it. The sliding doors had been locked, and there was no sign of forced entry.

  Two spider plants hung on either side of the doors, their long green leaves healthy and clearly cared for. There was an old transistor radio on a small wooden stand next to a poufy couch, with the only other furniture being a couple of wicker chairs and a coffee table. As they stepped into the room, Vera unlocked the sliding doors and opened them a crack to let some air in. Cory was glad she had, as it was stuffy and muggy.

  Several magazines were stacked up on a shelf underneath the coffee table, and Vera reached in and slipped out a slim laptop. Cory hadn’t noticed it before, but he’d had no real reason to, and he’d only quickly scanned the house anyhow. When she sat on the couch and opened the computer, Cory slumped down beside her.

  “Hang on a sec,” Vera said. She seemed a lot steadier with something to occupy her mind. Cory wondered how close she had been with Rohana Ashwell, if at all. As she fired up the laptop, she said, “Not much of an office, I know. I usually work from the study upstairs, and the conservatory is sometimes used as a waiting room.”

  The day was dull outside, despite it still being early morning. Cory could see his contorted reflection in the glass around the room, and the man staring back looked terrible. His bearded cheeks were sunken, and his hair needed a trim. As he watched the raindrops cutting meandering pathways along the window panes, he thought of all the times he had snapped at Bradley when his friend had told him he needed to look after himself better.

  Bradley would never bother him with such stuff again because his partner had been murdered out on Boughton Bluff. Early forensics hadn’t produced much, but Cory didn’t need CSI to tell him that the victim had known his killer. There were hardly any signs of a struggle, and what little they were going to find would point to a fight being put up only after it was too late. Cory had already figured that part out—had done so at the crime scene—and he knew it would have taken an element of surprise to get the jump on a man like Bradley Swanson.

 

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