Chapter Twenty-Nine
If CJ hadn’t been so caught up in obsessing about what she’d done, she might have paid more attention to the vehicle parked next to hers. Or the men loitering around it.
But she hadn’t been paying attention.
She never even looked until she was almost there and then it was too late.
She stalled. The rear passenger door of the fancy black SUV opened and Tyrone Nash emerged.
Fear coiled around CJ’s throat, squeezing off the ability to breathe. She was in a public place, though it was closed. Traffic was steady just a few yards away, but no one would notice the drama playing out beyond their field of vision.
Tall, thin, relatively handsome for a scumbag, Tyrone glared at her. The scar on his cheek stood out against his otherwise smooth skin. Clips from that night—his brute strength, her sheer desperation—whizzed through her head like a drunken bee.
“Dr. Patterson, I presume,” he said in that silky voice that he’d refined over the years. He could talk the talk with the most sophisticated in the city when he chose. But most of the time he talked the same trash as those hoodlums serving as his bodyguards.
CJ restrained any reaction. She stared at him, hoped he saw the hatred in her eyes. This scumbag was responsible for the suffering of so very many women, including her sister.
The silk shirt and trousers and gaudy leather shoes likely cost more than his girls earned in a month or maybe two. The expensive sunglasses he wore, even at night, reflected her vulnerable position.
She truly was a fool, running around out here in the dark.
Edward was right. Braddock was right. Damn, even Ricky had been right about her.
Maybe she shouldn’t have given her official tail the slip.
Tyrone walked up to CJ, stood toe-to-toe, stared down as if assessing her under a microscope. “You just keep on.” He shook his head. “Warning after warning. What’s it gonna take to keep you out of my business?”
Maybe it was the fact that he was in her face. Or maybe she’d wanted to do this since her one lucid thought had formed after Shelley’s death.
She slapped him. Slapped him as hard as she could for being the scumbag he was.
For luring desperate young women into a life of misery and shame.
The rush of adrenaline that fueled the move receded as quickly as it came.
She shuddered with the force of its withdrawal .
. . or maybe from touching this bastard barehanded.
His bodyguards closed in. Tyrone held up a hand to stop them.
“I got a score to settle with you already, Dr. Patterson. So I’m gonna give you that, but you listen to me closely.” He leaned nearer still. “The next time you wake up with blood all over you . . . it’ll be yours.”
He turned and walked back to his fancy SUV.
One of his goons opened the door. He took one last look at CJ, then climbed in.
The goon sent her a look that said he knew something she didn’t, then got into the back seat with his boss.
The final two loaded up and the vehicle barreled out of the parking lot.
CJ stood frozen beneath the meager glow of the distant streetlamps. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak. If she did, the emotions building inside her would burst free.
Tyrone had killed Celeste.
She didn’t have to wonder anymore.
She knew.
An SUV roared across the parking lot. Adrenaline blasted through her veins. She lunged for her rental. The vehicle skidded to a stop next to her, trapping her between it and the rental.
That was just like Tyrone. To send his other thugs to do his dirty work. Bastard!
She jammed her hand into her pocket after the fob.
The front passenger window of the vehicle powered down.
Hurry! She hit the unlock button. Reached for her door.
“We have to talk.”
CJ whipped around to face the familiar deep voice.
Braddock.
Between the panic and the darkness she hadn’t recognized his SUV.
The margin of relief that trickled through her was instantly replaced by suspicion. Where the hell had he come from?
He would be pissed that she’d lost the surveillance he had assigned to her. Apparently he knew her well enough to pick up her trail.
The charge of fear that had propelled her into escape mode vanished like the final blink of warning before her cell phone’s battery died. Her body trembled. She couldn’t restrain it.
“Don’t just stand there, CJ. Let’s go.”
An argument was on the tip of her tongue. But he could have news.
She’d barely gotten the door closed when he hit the gas. Fumbling for her seat belt, she asked, “Where are we going? Do you have news?”
He didn’t answer immediately. During that lapse of silence they passed a row of streetlights, allowing her to see the tic in his clenched jaw. Definitely angry.
“We’ve had this conversation. Just a few hours ago, in fact.”
“What conversation is that?” The idea that she hadn’t relocked her rental and that her purse was in there vied for her attention. Dammit.
“You’re going to get yourself killed if you don’t stay out of Nash’s way.”
Oh, that conversation. “I didn’t exactly go looking for him.” That part was true. “He came to me.”
“Because you were what?” Braddock braked for a light, shot her a dark glower. “Going around asking questions about one of his girls? After having given Jenkins the slip? The man is already skating on thin ice. Do you want to help him get fired?”
She hadn’t thought about that. “None of the village residents would talk to me with him following me around. I was desperate to find Celeste.” Besides, Braddock should be utilizing his time trying to find Shelley’s killer, not keeping up with CJ’s activities. She could take care of herself.
Flashes of a message scrawled in blood on her wall, and then more blood poured over her sheets while she slept, had her backtracking on that one.
“I don’t know how to get this through your head.” The light turned green and he set the SUV back in motion. “You can’t keep taking these risks.”
“If I don’t, who will?” That was the real question here. “Everyone’s afraid. No one will stand up to Tyrone.”
Silence throbbed inside the car.
She was right and Braddock knew it.
Something Tyrone had said to her bobbed to the surface of her churning thoughts. “The blood.” She chewed her lip to stop its quivering. “It wasn’t Ricky’s.”
“I know. I got a call from the lab an hour ago. The blood on your sheets didn’t belong to Banks, but it was human. I drove over to the Appleton house to give you the news, but you weren’t there. It took me a while to track you down.”
“You have my cell number.” She patted her pocket. “You didn’t try to call me.” He hadn’t wanted to call. He’d wanted to see what she was doing. “If you were that worried, why didn’t you call?”
“Because,” he admitted, “unlike Jenkins, I knew where to look. I’ve been following you around since you left the meeting with Cost at the clinic.”
CJ wanted to be mad. She wanted to yell at him. But she wasn’t stupid. She was grateful. Tyrone could have dragged her into his SUV and killed her the same way he probably had Celeste.
“It’s Celeste. He killed her.” The realization drained any remaining fight out of her. This was her responsibility. She’d gotten that girl murdered.
“You can’t be certain of that.” Another of those sidelong glances shot her way.
“It’s true.” CJ leaned against the headrest. She was tired. All of this was unbelievable. She’d stayed to help find her sister’s killer and she’d gotten dragged into the muck and mire of Tyrone’s dirty underworld. How could she get herself out and still learn the truth about her sister’s murder?
“Did Nash say that?”
“Of course he didn’t.” Why was Braddock patronizing her? “He said something like if I didn’t stay out of his business, the next time I woke up and found blood all over me it would be mine. It isn’t a confession, but I got the message.”
Braddock’s jaw started that rhythmic pulsing again, but he said nothing.
She’d just told him that Tyrone had committed a murder! What was wrong with him? “You have nothing to say? Shouldn’t you go question Tyrone or something?”
He cut her another of those looks. “You know the answer to that. It’s a little thing called lack of evidence.”
More of that thick silence.
She frowned as he slowed for a turn off Whitesburg. “Where’re we going?” She’d expected that he would just drive around, then take her back to the parking lot.
“Someplace where we won’t be interrupted.” He glanced at her. “While I try to get it through your head once and for all that you’re making yourself an easy target.”
“We have to go back to my rental car first. I didn’t lock the door and my bag is in there.”
He didn’t argue or complain, just executed a U-turn and headed back to the medical plaza parking lot.
She studied his profile as he drove. She wished she could read his mind. Could see all his secrets.
There was a mystery she doubted could be solved in several lifetimes.
Once she had her bag and her rental was locked, they headed to his place.
Braddock lived in a condo near Whitesburg Drive’s shopping and restaurant district.
Like all good Huntsville views, his balcony looked out over the treed mountains that flanked the city.
What she’d seen of the condo confirmed what she knew so far about the man.
The decorating was nice, probably here when he moved in, but there were no personal touches.
Nothing that defined the man beneath the unreadable exterior.
“I don’t have any clean glasses.” He offered her a cold bottle of beer.
“This is fine.” Since he’d already removed the top, she took a long swallow. It felt good. The heat had dampened her skin and the humidity made a deep breath an effort. But it was easier to be on the balcony with Braddock than inside.
He’d said they needed to talk. A crystal ball wasn’t required to know the subject matter. He was a cop; it was his job to protect and serve. He wanted her to cease and desist with this little private investigation.