Prologue #3
While she didn’t want a case she couldn’t solve, she did want something a little less boring. A dead homeless person in a building?
That one wouldn’t take long to solve.
She’d bet on it.
What was going to be the outcome?
Oh, well, maybe it would be a stabbing by another homeless person like the last three?
Yeah…
Case solved.
Yeah, Holladay had little to offer by way of exciting cases. She would kill to have something a little more…juicy that would add to her resume.
Not detract.
Unluckily for her, she never got anything good to work on, like the other detectives. She’d read about someone digging up graves to rob them, and that was marginally better than what she always got.
Well, this was her life.
At least after work, she had a better existence the second she got home.
These kinds of cases were about as exciting as they got in Holladay, and she was going to have to just swallow it.
Her boss was going to keep giving her the shitty ones—unless she slept with him.
Oh, and Tora wasn’t that kind of a girl—anymore. She didn’t bed hop, and she certainly didn’t put out for a man who tried to use that as leverage.
That wasn’t happening.
As a child, she had to survive.
As a detective, she carried a gun for a reason. Her boss liked to think he was the alpha in the room, but everyone knew the female of the species was far more deadly.
And.
They.
Were.
Her youth was not her adulthood.
Yeah, she started out doing sketchy things, that had changed when someone took the time to save a young girl with no family. So, she wasn’t going back.
PASS.
After being pulled out of that kind of a mess, she was given the opportunity to change her life. Someone helped her get into college, where she was able to get her degree and start her career.
By the grace of the universe, she’d been pulled from the pit, and given a chance to show what she could do.
Now, at thirty-six, all she wanted was to work an exciting case, go home, watch a movie, and eat pasta on the couch.
Was that so damn crazy?
Was that so much to ask?
It certainly didn’t involve having sex with a man she barely liked as he wanted to exert his power over her as the ONLY female detective on staff.
Men like that didn’t even get her attention, and she blamed her life before being saved. To get her attention, you had to be a special kind of a man.
Kind.
Sweet.
Protective.
Now, that was the alpha man in her world.
Tora had been a stripper, and struggled to even survive as a child on the street. Now, she was surviving, but struggling to keep climbing the ladder.
In the back of her mind, she was preparing to move on, interviewing in a bigger city, but Holladay did have a few things going for it.
Mainly, her partner.
He was the cat’s meow.
Still, she knew there was writing on the wall.
All she had to do was get her time in as a detective, and move to someplace busier.
Because Holladay was NOT it.
Trust her.
What wouldn’t she give for a good case chock full of twists and turns?
Finding a dead body behind a building with a needle still in her arm didn’t exactly scream challenge.
That was a no-brainer.
Right?
A non-cop could have figured that one out.
The dead woman had all the drugs in her system, so, logically, that meant one thing.
If it walked like an accidental death, and it looked like an accidental death, it wasn’t a fun homicide. Someone had needed a quiet place to shoot up, and she had.
To.
Her.
Death.
Yeah, it was probably wrong to think of it like that, but if anything, Tora liked to keep it real.
She was crazy like that.
Now, unfortunately, she was at the newest crime scene, waiting for her partner to roll up.
Detective Mac Yardley was late, as usual. He was likely picking up some coffee or breakfast for them. He was considerate like that.
He was the ONE thing about this job that she did like.
A.
LOT.
Now, she didn’t want to wait for him to arrive any longer. It was best to get this shitshow over with, here and now.
He’d have to meet her on the scene.
Ducking under the tape where a door had once been, Tora headed inside and found the city ME kneeling beside the dead victim.
“Hey, Doctor. I see we meet again,” she said, pulling out her little notebook, and getting ready for anything that he could give her. “Crazy, huh? We should meet in a bookstore next time, where they serve coffee.”
He laughed as he looked up.
“Yeah, this seems to happen a lot. We should do something about it. I know! How about we bring snacks next time? I’m starving,” Doctor Alexi Redmond admitted. “I was just about to have breakfast at work, and didn’t have time.”
Oh, well, never say she wasn’t prepared for long, tedious days where she didn’t get to eat.
That came with the territory.
She reached into her pocket, and pulled out a granola bar. Then, Tora waved it in front of his face.
“I tell you what. You talk about the body, and I’ll break off pieces and feed it to you.”
His stomach grumbled.
That was all she had to hear.
Someone wasn’t going to try and stall with the answers on this one, and she appreciated that.
“Please,” he said. “I’m starving. I’d do anything for food—including letting you do his internal temperature.”
Uh, pass.
She wasn’t sticking a probe into anyone.
That wasn’t the kind of fun she craved.
But the feeding him part…?
That worked for her. She unwrapped part of it and let him take a bite.
He chewed, and as he did, they did the dance.
“You have a sixty-ish-year-old man, and it looks like he’s homeless. His clothes are filthy, and there’s the smell that the homeless tend to get since they are unable to wash up.”
She was making notes.
Oh, and standing back a few feet.
“Any ID?” she asked.
He nodded.
“He’s got tags and a wallet,” he said, moving his collar of his old flannel shirt. “IDs say his name is Jonathan M. Miller, Corporal in the US Army. They’re pretty worn, and I’m going to say by the look of him, so is he. Someone’s seen some shit,” he admitted.
Immediately, she sighed.
Well, that sucked.
“I hate when we find a vet. It’s such a sad way for them to go, being homeless. Since I know you, the wallet and tags won’t be enough. So, get me positive ID, and I’ll contact the vet center. How did he die?” she asked.
The man moved the rest of his incredibly bloody shirt, and there was a stab wound to his chest.
“It looks like he took a jab to the heart. I’ll say that’s likely COD, but don’t hold me to it until I open him up. I’ll know then, Detective.”
She wrote it down, and then fed him more granola bar to keep him talking.
A girl had to do what a girl had to do.
Oddly, this was the most normal part of her job.
“There are no blood trail droplets, so I’m going to say he likely got assaulted right here and dropped. The blood pooled under him.”
Yeah, likely.
That sounded right.
The homeless community tended to squat in the abandoned buildings during storms and the winter.
It was an ongoing issue for the city. What always befuddled her was that they could just renovate all the closed buildings and give the people a place to call home.
The city would be happy.
The place would be less run-down…
But she was just a cop.
What did she know?
“How about TOD? Can you give me that so I can see if I can talk to some homeless people and see when they saw him last?” she asked.
There was no doubt he had friends.
The homeless stuck together.
“There’s a homeless encampment not far from here by the river, and that’s where Mac and I will head first.”
He was doing the liver probe as they spoke, and the math that went along with it. Instead of saying anything, he just kept calculating.
Before he was finished, her partner, Mac, made an appearance. In his hand was a tray with three coffees in it, and that told her all she needed to know.
Bless him.
She could use some coffee.
They’d both been up late last night.
“Hey, am I late?” he asked, grinning at her like it was their private joke.
She laughed.
If she had a dollar for every single time he was late, she’d be a wealthy, wealthy woman.
“Mac, you’re always late.”
He shrugged before handing her a coffee, as he left the ME’s in the tray next to his medical kit.
“Yes, but I bring presents. Who else is gonna keep you caffeinated, Tora? That’s better than anything, and you know it. You’re feisty when you’re not drinking a coffee.”
He had a very valid point.
She was.
Because the ME was focused on something, she kept talking, bantering with her partner.
“Late night for you, too?” she asked as the ME was still working on TOD.
He grinned at her.
Oh, she knew he had a late one.
They both did.
“You know it. I was out with a hot date.”
She snorted.
Yeah, she wasn’t going there. There was a time and a place, and this was NOT the place. Work was work, and play—that was for after hours in a personal life.
Pointing at the victim, he went there.
“What did I miss?” he asked.
Alexi caught him up to date after Tora fed him the last piece of granola bar.
He chewed and shared.
“Stab wound to the heart area of the chest, he was likely homeless and a vet, but I want dentals to make sure—or medical records to confirm. Congrats. You’re caught up. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, didn’t we just do this two months ago?”
Yeah, they had.
Mac sighed.
As a vet himself, before he became a cop, he knew that more veterans were homeless than should be.
“That sucks. Do we have his name?” he asked, not sure how they knew he was a vet.
Tora nodded, and showed him what she’d written down. On her little notepad, there were two things.
‘Jonathan Miller—US Army, dog tags/wallet.’
Well, that was no big shock.
He knew many vets kept their tags on them at all times, even when they weren’t in battle. His were tucked into his wallet.
Old habits die hard.
“Doc will give us positive once he gets the vet center to send over his medical records.”
The man on the floor spoke up, finally having an answer for Tora.