What Doesn’t Kill You… (The Misfits: Benson Security #2)

Prologue

Five years earlier

Glasgow, Scotland

On a cold, dreich night in Glasgow’s West End, Detective Inspector Violet Lee stood over the body of the man she’d been hunting and felt nothing but irritation.

When she’d last seen him, he’d been very much alive.

Now, he was lying in a pile of garbage while her colleagues gossiped among themselves, and the whisper of her name carried on the chill night air.

“Violet Lee…another suspect dying violently…"

"…third one in as many months…"

"Can’t be a coincidence…”

Violet tuned out the speculation as the crowd worked around her.

Pressing her hand against her ribs, where the dead man had gotten in a kick that afternoon, she crouched on the wet, black pavement beside him.

Puddles, leftover from heavier rain earlier that evening, reflected the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles, glowing blue and red in the night.

The exact same colors that would appear on her skin in the days to come.

Forcing herself to block out the circus happening around them, she focused on the man propped against the old tenement wall.

Although it seemed fitting that a brutal murderer should have ended up dumped with the trash, this wasn’t the way Violet had wanted things to end.

She’d wanted to see him in a cell, terrified of his fellow inmates and what they’d do to him.

She’d wanted him to live out a very long life, suffering the same kind of fear and abuse that he’d inflicted on his victims.

Sadly, you didn’t always get what you wanted.

Instead, his face had been pulverized by fists much stronger than Violet’s own, and his limbs lay at angles impossible to attain without broken bones.

It was an all too familiar sight.

“I see our suspect has been beaten to death.” Chief Inspector Murray McFarlane was a master of stating the obvious. He was also unsurprised. “And your knuckles are raw, DI Lee.”

It was the kind of casual observation he was famous for making. As though commenting on the weather, instead of letting the perpetrator know he was on to them.

Only, she wasn’t a perpetrator.

Slowly, she stood and turned to face her boss who, like everyone else she knew, was at least a head taller than her.

“What are you doing out of the office?” Usually, it took the promise of food or a summons from HQ to get him to leave his desk.

“This is the third one of your suspects to die this year after they've had an altercation with you.” He eyed her solemnly. “There are questions that need answering.”

“Like whether or not I killed him?”

“Violet, you know that’s not what I thi—“

“We fought earlier,” she interrupted in a toneless voice. Nothing to see here, nothing to hear. “He got away.”

Murray kept his eyes on the body. “We have witnesses to your fight with the dead man. One woman said you were doing your kung fu crap on him. Kicked him on the side of his head.”

“A glancing blow.” She wished it’d been harder.

“Her husband said you seemed more intent on hitting him than arresting him.” Murray slowly turned his attention toward her, and she saw only pity-filled resignation in his eyes. “It’s out of my hands now, Violet. Management have heard the rumors and they’ve started an internal investigation.”

She looked past him, through the crowd, to where her so-called partner was joking around with some other male cops.

Aye, she bet she knew exactly who’d ensured those rumors got to management’s ears.

Danny Rossi was a lecherous weasel who was more interested in grabbing her backside than doing his job, yet he still believed she got his promotion.

She had no regrets over breaking his hand for touching her.

After all, he’d been warned. Unfortunately, it seemed like the pervert held a grudge.

“It doesn’t look good,” Murray said, keeping his voice low.

No. It didn’t. Violet ground her teeth together until her jaw began to ache. She would not protest her innocence again. She’d spent hours doing that after the first two bodies had turned up bloody.

She lifted her chin and stared her boss down. “Guess we’re going to have to let The Police Investigation and Review Commission sort this out. I have nothing to hide.”

Murray nodded before crouching to get a closer look at the victim.

“Would rather not have turned this over to the PIRCs but we don’t have a choice.

" He pronounced the internal affairs abbreviation the way all cops did, as pricks instead of pircs.

To say they were unwelcome was to put it mildly.

"Looks like he was kicked or shoved into the wall. There are fresh stone chips where he hit before he fell.”

Violet crouched beside her boss. The smell of wet, molding garbage made her want to gag far more than the sight of the dead man.

She examined the red brick wall and nodded. “Would have taken quite a bit of force to cause that kind of damage.” It went without saying that someone trained to put their full body weight behind a kick could have done it—someone like her.

With latex gloved hands, Murray leaned over and opened the buttons on the front of the dead man’s shirt. A large red welt appeared in the middle of his pasty-white chest. Violet’s breath hitched in her throat.

“Boot print,” she said, fighting hard to keep the relief out of her voice.

“Wee bit bigger than your tiny feet.” Murray sounded as relieved as she felt. His eyes caught hers as he ran a hand over his shaven head. “There will still be questions, Violet. And probably a suspension to weather.”

Her jaw clenched again. You hit one too many people in self-defense and suddenly you’re a pariah.

It wasn’t like Scottish cops had guns to threaten off dangerous criminals.

No, all they had to back them up was the weight of the law and the hope their prey would surrender.

It wasn’t a great strategy when you were a female cop who barely skimmed five-feet tall, and it didn’t help that her Chinese heritage had gifted her with a slight build and a face that looked barely out of its teens.

There was always the odd dirtbag who decided to strike out at a fragile-looking cop rather than surrender.

Weirdly, they were always surprised when she struck back.

As another vehicle angled into the wide alley between old tenement buildings, the beams from its headlights bounced off the wall beside the victim’s head and Violet sucked in a breath.

Murray, who missed nothing, said, “What? What did you see?”

She walked around to the other side of the body before crouching again. Holding her breath, she shone her flashlight on the wall beside the killer’s head. A chill went up her spine.

The light beam wobbled slightly as she looked over at her boss. “It’s another message.”

Grimly, he stood and came over behind her.

“Well, hell,” he muttered.

“Yeah,” was all Violet could think to say.

Scratched into the brick, beside the victim’s head, were the words: your welcome.

The exact same words, with the exact same grammatical error, that she’d found near the last two criminals she’d been suspected of killing.

Both of whom she'd had violent altercations with on the day they'd died.

It was a coincidence that'd worried her.

Now, she realized it was actually a pattern. A very deliberate pattern.

Her boss rubbed his chin, appearing suddenly weary. “Hate to say it,” he said, keeping his voice low. “But I think you’ve got a—”

“Don’t,” she snapped, cutting him off.

But it was too late, the word was in the air between them.

Stalker.

Violet Lee, Detective Inspector, had a violent stalker.

One who targeted the suspects who hurt her.

With something like this hanging over her head, there was no way in hell management would ever let her out of the office again.

She’d be stuck on desk duty until they caught the bastard.

And seeing as they didn’t have even a shred of evidence hinting at who it could be, that would be a very long time indeed.

She stared at the words scratched into the wall and knew exactly what they signified. They weren’t a clue to a killer. They were the death knell of her career.

Toronto, Canada

That same year

Max Durant clenched his fists against his thighs and fought the urge to punch his boss. He wasn’t a violent man. He preferred to take his revenge on the printed page but, seeing as that avenue had been stolen from him, he’d settle for dishing out a bloody nose.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Ronald Chambers said with a weary sigh.

“You want to hit me. You think you’re the first reporter to come into my office with that look in your eye?

You won’t be the last either. But you may as well face facts.

My hands are tied. The publisher wants this story buried and that’s what we’re going to do. ”

“It’s bullshit and you know it.” Max managed to spit the words out.

Ronald loosened his tie, leaving it crooked. “It’s business. You can’t bite the hand that feeds you and get away with it. The owner’s family and the Poole family go way back. Hell, they even have neighboring weekend cottages up in Muskoka. Lake Joseph, I believe.”

Of course they did. And by cottages, Ronald meant mansions.

“I have a good story here.” Max paced the carpet in front of Ronald’s desk. Behind him, the blinds had been pulled on a wall of windows separating the editor from the newsroom outside. “I have proof that Damien Poole is involved in a criminal enterprise.”

“You don’t have proof.” Ronald waved a dismissive hand at the documents in front of him. “You have suspicion, rumors, and conjecture. You know better than to try to push a story through on this alone. Face it, in your eagerness to go after some rich asshole, you rushed the job.”

“I have a witness who saw Damien talking to a Russian mobster.”

“You have a waitress who overheard some stuff she doesn’t fully understand.”

“I have photos of him having clandestine meetings.”

Ronald held up the photos. “These? They’re unprintable.

Just a bunch of out-of-focus blobs with so much pixelation it looks like it’s snowing—in June!

” He tossed them back on the desk in disgust. “Face it, kid, you got nothing. And yeah,” he held up a hand to stop Max’s protest. “I was willing to run with it, to give you some leeway and see if you could pad this out some, but the owner disagrees with me.

Poole and his lawyers are upstairs with him now, and they've made it clear that if the story runs, we'll all end up in court. He wants the story killed before that happens. It's time to let this go.” He pushed the file over the desk toward Max. “Write something else. You’ll get another chance to bring Poole down in the future.”

“Will I?” Max demanded as he scooped up the file. Fury and frustration were riding him so hard he could hear blood pounding through his veins.

Ronald sighed and leaned forward, belatedly noticing the mustard stain on the front of his shirt, and swatting at it with irritation before turning his attention back to Max.

“You’re a talented reporter. You’ve got tenacity and skill.

We both know you aren’t gonna leave this alone, but you have to face facts.

You just don’t have the proof you need to run with a story like this.

Not against a man who can afford the best legal team possible.

Take a day, or two, go breathe in some fresh air or have a stack of pancakes.

Pancakes fix everything. No matter what you do, take the time to calm the hell down.

Then regroup and try again. But believe me when I tell you—this story is dead. ”

Every muscle in Max’s body vibrated with tension as he jerked the office door open.

It bounced off the flimsy partition wall, making it wobble.

All eyes in the newsroom turned to him, most filled with understanding and sympathy, some with shock, because Max wasn't usually one to lose his temper. He didn’t want or need their empathy.

He needed justice. After tossing the useless file on his desk, he grabbed his jacket and stalked from the room.

Too wound up to wait for the elevator, Max ran down the stairs to the lobby.

And straight into the devil himself.

Damien Poole, flanked by his attorneys, strode out of the elevator as though he owned the world.

Dressed in a suit that cost more than Max's apartment, he held his head high.

The king looking down on his subjects. As if fated, his gaze stopped when it landed on Max and recognition registered.

He cocked his blond head in acknowledgment and smirked smugly.

"Good try," he mouthed before dismissing Max entirely and striding out into the afternoon sun.

Max turned and punched the wall beside him.

There were gasps as people gave him a wide berth.

He barely registered their wary glances.

Because his mind wasn’t on the reception area, it was on his small dorm room, years earlier.

The place where he’d held his friend while she’d cried her eyes out and whispered about the horrors Damien Poole had inflicted on her.

Max had wanted her to go to the cops, to swear out a formal complaint and humiliate the bastard in public—for all the things he’d done to her in private. But she wouldn’t do it.

“He’s too powerful,” she whispered. “Too rich. Nobody will believe me, and I don’t have the money to fight him.”

Instead, she’d let the attack eat at her, nibbling away until it consumed her whole.

And that was on Damien Poole.

"You're bleeding, Max." Arthur, one of the guards working desk duty came up beside him. "Let's go to the break room and get you cleaned up."

Max looked down at his bloody knuckles and felt nothing. His attention strayed to the street outside, where Damien was climbing into a waiting limo. The smug bastard was going to get away clean. Again. His jaw clenched as he watched the limo slip into traffic.

"Hey, Max," Arthur said stepping in front of him to block his view. "We need to get that hand seen to, buddy. You hear me?"

Max forced himself to look at the man. "What?"

"Your hand." He gestured toward it. "Looks like you're having a bad day. Come on, let's get you fixed up."

"Yeah, sure." Max let himself be led away from the curious onlookers.

"Did you lose out on a story or something?" Arthur asked, used to dealing with reporters, and aware that things could get emotional. "It's not like you to get physical. You're normally such an even-keeled guy. You must be having a bad day, son."

"Something like that," Max said as they went down the hall to the security staff's break room.

"Don't let it get to you." The guard shoved open the door. "Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Next time'll be better."

A surge of pure determination flooded Max's system. "Yes," he vowed. "It will."