AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Hope’s eyes were black in the moonlight. Her face so pale. She looked just like Pen there now. Like the teenage niece she barely knew. Just a kid.
Kimball cursed. “No, baby girl. No. I didn’t mean it, peanut. I didn’t.”
At any minute he was going to call himself daddy. It wouldn’t have shocked Haldyn at all. He sounded just like he was talking to a young child whenever he talked to Hope. Like she’d heard him talk to his daughter before.
Sol Kimball had loved his daughter. She had known that. “We need to get her to the hospital. Detective Kimball, Sol, we need to get Hope to help now. To her sister. Her sister’s a doctor. And one of her nieces. FCGH. Let’s get her there to her family, okay?”
“We can’t leave Wilson behind,” Madison said. Haldyn looked up. Madison was standing over Wilson now. “He is the answer Major Crimes has been looking for. He knows things, Hal. He’s going to pay for what he’s done. Answer all the questions we’ve had forever. And for what he did to Heather that night. I’m going to make him pay for what he did to Heather, no matter what. He has to pay for Heather, too. I’m going to make him, Haldyn. I’m going to. I’m going to tell Dom what he did to Heather and Hope and I’m going to turn Dom loose on him. Dom and Jarrod and Murdoch and all the rest. So they can tear him apart. And…then…Miguel Rodriguez. Because he shot Miguel, too. He said so, in the van. He said he did it. Because Miguel got between him and Heather. And he believes no man can take Heather from him. Because Heather is his. But she never was yours, you sick bastard.”
There was a gun in Madison’s hands. Madison was standing over Steve Wilson, a fierce look on her face Haldyn would never forget. Haldyn could see it, in the bright light of the full moon above them now.
Tonight was a night for full moons. The irrelevant thought had her almost sobbing, as she tried to get Hope to her feet. “I want to watch, Mads. I want to see what Miguel does to him, what Jarrod does to him, too. I’ll video tape it, Mads. I promise. You just…keep that gun pointed at him. Sol, you have to help us get him in the van.”
The van was big enough for them all. In the back.
“Let’s do that. Hope, baby girl, you just stay real calm, okay? I’ll get you to the hospital. Back to your mama. I promise. If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll get you back to your mama, peanut. You’ll be okay. I’ll make it okay, this time. I promise.”
83
The alert signal flashed. Jarrod paused. Looked at the rest of Major Crimes around them. They were just hanging around, deciding what to focus on next, while they waited on Heather to finish her call. They were going to wrap for the night, he thought. Head out.
Start fresh in the morning.
The light was flashing—just like it had when Haldyn had been attacked. When Miguel had been ambushed. Something had happened. And it was bad.
He did a fast roll call. Fields was up in Wyoming with his family, at Rory's friend's place. Gunnar was off somewhere playing trained monkey-in-a-tuxedo with that little rabbit of his. Heather was in the side conference room, on the phone. He could see her through the small window, that look of irritation he was so familiar with on her gorgeous face. She waved at him, impatiently. She’d just have to catch up with them later.
Lila, Jake, Lake, and Dom were already grabbing their gear. Daniel had his phone at his ear, right behind them. Callum and Evers were off—they'd have to be called back in. Unless they or their women and children were the ones in trouble.
Daniel disconnected. "DB. In our back parking lot. Security cams picked it up. Guard saw the film when he clocked in. Apparently, as of two days ago, we now have a two-hour window when we don't even have a damned security guard in front of the cameras, guys. Because that’s a smart idea and everything; thanks Wichita Falls for that. I don't have any other details. Guard’s the one who turned on the emergency signal."
"Who was assigned to guard the lot?" Jarrod asked. If there was a dead body out there, and someone was guarding that lot—it didn’t take much to do the math.
"Kimball."
It was most likely Sol Kimball out there now. Jarrod had never liked that guy, but he didn’t want Kimball’s body in the damned back parking lot.
It took them less than two minutes to get out of the building and to the back parking lot. They found a crowd already growing. MacGregor was there, leaning over a body. Until Miguel was back from the two weeks he was out recuperating—MacGregor was in charge of the Homicide division.
MacGregor looked up at them, an angry expression on his face. One every cop there understood. "It's Bell."
Detective Luke Bell, the guy from Kimball’s assault division. Jarrod had worked with him before.
Daryn Evers, the ME assistant—Mike Evers's wife—was leaning over the body as well. "Two to the chest, guys. And... I think he was run over by a vehicle. Not saying definitely, but?—"
"Security guard is checking the feed," MacGregor said. Technically, this was his case. But the idea of that made Jarrod's skin crawl. Something about MacGregor wasn’t sitting so right with him now. Not since Cold Case had started and Jarrod had been digging into everyone’s unsolveds. There were too many cold cases with MacGregor’s name on them now. Either he was really incompetent or there was a reason.
"We'll need to get forensics out here," Daniel said. "MacGregor, you're assisting me."
Jarrod didn't miss the irritation on MacGregor's face. But hell, they had a dead cop from the major crimes assault division in the middle of their parking lot. This was going to require the big guns.
Starting with finding the man who was supposed to be out here guarding the lot. Bell’s own supervisor. Where in the hell was Sol Kimball?
He pulled his phone. Haldyn would be the one to work this. Dead cop equaled head of the lab, instantly. And that meant, Jarrod wasn’t leaving his woman’s side. He just wasn’t. It surprised him she hadn’t shown up by now already. Haldyn always had an ear to what was going on in the building.
He dialed.
And heard...ringing. That familiar ringtone. Far too close to where he stood.
