Harlequin Intrigue April 2021--Box Set 2 of 2 Carol Ericson (short books to read TXT) 📖

swings when we spotted him. It’s a park. Why does anyone need to be hiding in the woods? Unless he’s there to watch kids. So we called the officers over. We hoped they could talk to the guy or scare him off.”

“Who was it?” Anderson asked. “Did you recognize this guy?”

Imani shook her head. “No. We’re new to Desparre. We don’t know that many people yet. After the blast, he was gone.”

“What did he look like?” Anderson asked.

“He was white,” Imani said. “In his thirties, probably. Brown hair, I think.”

Excitement thrummed along Jax’s skin and he suddenly understood how the FBI agents probably felt when they got a promising lead. He’d seen it on their faces before, the sudden thrill of the chase, but he’d never felt it so intensely himself until now.

Rodney Brown had reddish-blond hair, but from a distance it might seem brown. And he was white, would be in his thirties now.

“Anything else you remember?” Anderson pressed. “Height, maybe? Or facial hair?”

Imani shook her head. “No facial hair. But he was pretty tall. Close to my husband’s height, I think.”

Jax frowned, studying Wesley, who was probably only an inch shorter than Jax’s six foot one. Rodney was five foot eight. Then again, the distance between the swing set and the woods was probably twenty feet. If the guy had been skulking close to the trees, maybe that had thrown off her perception, made it hard to get a good look. Plus, a bomb had gone off shortly after she’d seen him.

Then again, maybe it hadn’t been Rodney she’d seen. Maybe it was Rodney’s elusive roommate.

KEARA SLIPPED INSIDE the police station. She checked in quickly with Sam, who was sitting at the front desk again today, then let out a relieved breath when she reached the empty bullpen.

She’d been at the bomb site and talking to members of the community since 7 a.m. Checking the time on her phone confirmed it was now past 3 p.m. She hadn’t stopped for lunch and there was only so long the scrambled eggs Jax had cooked that morning could hold her. She didn’t have an appetite.

Not after seeing the blood staining her park. Not after talking to the hospital, hearing the words extremely critical and coma when she’d asked about both Nate and Talise. But her stomach growled and her head pounded, and the coffeepot in the bullpen was calling her name. So was a quick break and a little solitude, before heading back out to talk to more people, find out if anyone had seen something that might help them find the bomber.

After dumping the sludge at the bottom of the pot that someone had brewed early that morning, Keara started a fresh one. Then she leaned against the wall, started to close her eyes.

Just before they drifted shut, she saw the stack of files on her desk through the glass walls of her office. The cases with the symbols.

Technically, they all belonged to the FBI. She probably wasn’t even supposed to look at them. She definitely wasn’t supposed to have them.

Pushing herself away from the wall, Keara grabbed the coffee carafe and poured everything that had brewed so far into a mug. Then she strode into her office, pushed the door shut and sat at her desk, staring at the stack of Yes files she and Jax had been so excited about yesterday.

There were four murders and an arson in those files. Add in the murder of Celia Harris in Houston and the bombs in Luna and Desparre and what did it all mean?

Keara slapped her hand against the desk in frustration, making it sting. Then she took a long sip of her coffee, willing the headache away, and got to work.

First, the murders. Celia Harris had been abducted, left in an alley, her killing brutal, from multiple stab wounds. She’d been a tough victim to grab, a pillar of the community with young kids and a husband at home. The symbol had been spray-painted onto the wall behind where her body was found. That had been seven years ago in Texas.

Skipping over the arson for now, Keara opened up the next murder. Five years ago, in Nebraska. The victim was a nineteen-year-old boy, on his way home from college. He’d disappeared from one side of town, only to show up on the opposite side a day later, with the symbol drawn in permanent marker across his back. He’d been killed in the time in between, from blunt force trauma to the head. He was a popular kid, a basketball star at his college. But he’d also been brought up on two sets of sexual assault charges and was estranged from his parents.

Four years ago, in Iowa. The victim was a middle-aged man, an ex-marathon runner scheduled to speak at the small town’s high school track meet. The event was a big deal in the town and when he hadn’t shown up, it had caused a huge uproar. His body being found later that night in a cornfield was the biggest crime they’d seen in more than a decade. He’d been shot three times, the symbol drawn thickly in pen on his arm.

Three years ago, in South Dakota. The victim was a popular middle school teacher who’d survived a heart attack the year before. She’d been grabbed and killed within a few hours, but a witness to the kidnapping had only been able to say her killer was a white male. She was strangled, found on a playground with the symbol spray-painted on the slide behind her.

Two years ago, in Montana. The victim was the newly elected mayor of a small town, with deeply polarizing views. He’d been last seen staggering drunk out of a bar. He was found a day later, in his own backyard, dead from a blow to the head. The medical examiner hadn’t been able to determine if he’d fallen and cracked his own skull open or if someone had done it for him,