Brian Freeman - The Voice Inside

“There’s no answer at her apartment, Inspector,” the policewoman told him.

“Have you searched the area?” Frost asked.

“No, we just got here.”

“Circle the building,” he told her. “Be careful. This is Rudy Cutter, so expect him to be armed and dangerous.”

“Yes, sir.”

He gestured to the other officer. “Let’s check the back.”

The two of them headed for the rear of the building, where the apartments faced a dead-end alley and the densely wooded hillside. A river ran along the curb, where rainwater trickled from the muddy slope. Jess’s apartment was on the second floor. He stood below her balcony, and then he walked out to the other side of the alley to get a better view. Even in the darkness, he could see it.

The broken window. The open door.

Frost bolted for the locked gate below her apartment and hauled himself up until he could grab the railing of the second-floor balcony. He shouted at the cop waiting for him. “Get around to the front, I’ll let you in. Call more backup out here right now! And an ambulance!”

He swung his leg up, jumped, and landed hard on the other side of the railing. The vertical blinds beyond the open patio door slapped back and forth with the breeze. Glass glittered on the carpet. He had his gun out, and he stormed into the apartment.

“Jess!”

His voice was loud, but no one answered. The apartment smelled like Jess, which meant it smelled like cigarettes. He couldn’t see anything in the darkness. He knew where the light switches were, and he turned on the nearest lamp, squinting at the sudden brightness. Then his gaze swept the living room.

His heart stopped.

She was there. Just inside the front door. On her back, limbs sprawled. Blood was everywhere.

“Jess.”

He didn’t know if he’d said her name out loud or whether it was simply in his heart. He went to her and knelt over her. He checked her pulse, but there was nothing for him to do. Grayness had painted over her face. Her eyes were closed. Her skin was still warm, but she was gone. Fragments from the Taser blast that had stunned her sprayed the carpet. The knife that had opened up her throat, drowned her, bled her out, lay on the floor next to her.

Frost saw a chair tipped over on the carpet. It wasn’t in the right place. Cutter had sat in that chair and waited for Jess to come home. He’d lured her out of her apartment and sent them on a false chase at the Fillmore after a girl who meant nothing, while Cutter crossed the city to stalk his real target.

Jess was the eighth victim.

Every “what if” that might have changed this moment played out in Frost’s mind in a split second. There were a thousand different things he could have done, and Jess would still be alive.

What if he’d stopped Cutter at the Fillmore.

What if he’d gone home with Jess tonight, instead of leaving her alone.

What if he’d thrown Melanie Valou’s watch off the Golden Gate Bridge and let Cutter rot in prison.

But none of it changed the reality that he’d failed her. Cutter had won. Jess was dead.

Frost took her hand. He squeezed, but she didn’t squeeze back. That was when he noticed that Jess had a slim gold watch on her wrist. Jess never wore a watch. The crystal on the face was smashed, but he could still make out the time, which was frozen in place and would stay that way forever.

3:42 a.m.

The night passed for Frost in a haze of sleeplessness and grief.

He never went home. Instead, he spent hours in a small interview room in the police headquarters building in the Mission Bay District. This was where he typically talked to witnesses and suspects, but this time, he was the witness. The detectives on the case went over the details of the night with him. They asked the same questions again and again, trying to tease out new facts from his memory. In the end, he didn’t have much to tell them.

He hadn’t been there when the murder happened. He hadn’t seen anything.

Everyone knew Rudy Cutter was guilty, but knowing something was true didn’t mean they could prove it.

The building was dead quiet. The death of a cop always hung over the force like a cloud, but this was Jess. She was a cop’s cop, third-generation SFPD, an angry fighter for all things blue. Except, Frost knew, that was all in the past. She’d lost her badge. She’d gone down in disgrace and had been staring at prison time for her sins. Her murder was a tragedy, but there would be no city funeral, no parade, no speech from the chief and the mayor.

It was still dark when they were done with the interview.

He stopped at his desk and could feel the eyes of everyone watching him, but no one said a thing. He had a reputation for being a lone wolf, and it was mostly deserved. He didn’t hang out in the police bars; he didn’t party and drink with the other cops. That made him different, still a stranger after five years. His one real ally was Jess, and now she was gone.

Frost felt exhaustion weighing him down, although he knew he wouldn’t sleep. He headed for the elevator, but he stopped when a voice cut across the stillness of the room.

“Easton.”

He turned around. It was Captain Hayden.

“Let’s talk,” he said in a voice that always sounded as if he’d just come back from a root canal.

Frost followed Hayden into his office, which had windows looking north toward the Giants stadium. It was a nice office, but Hayden had his sights set on the office upstairs. He’d started out as a street cop thirty years earlier, and he’d climbed the promotions ladder, greasy rung by greasy rung, until the only step left was the one that would make him the chief. Hayden wasn’t going to let anything stand in his way. Not even the murder of his ex-wife.

“So you’re the one who found her,” the captain rumbled.

“Yes, sir.”

“Did she suffer?”

“I don’t know, sir. I imagine it was brutal but quick.”

“Hard to believe anybody getting the drop on Jess,” Hayden said.

“Cutter had it well planned. He was waiting for her where she couldn’t see him. First the Taser, then the knife. She didn’t stand a chance.”

Hayden coughed, and then he wiped his eyes. “Cutter,” he murmured.

“Yes, sir.”

The captain walked around to the back of his desk and squeezed into a high-back leather chair. Pruitt Hayden was one of the largest human beings Frost had ever met. He was six foot four, well over three hundred pounds, and he could bench-press his weight. His black skin was freckled and mottled, and his scalp had a dark shadow of stubble. He always wore his dress blues, with folds impeccably creased.

“Sit, Easton.”

Frost took the chair in front of the desk. He noticed that Hayden still kept a framed photo of Jess where he could see it. The photo had been taken ten years earlier, when they were just married and honeymooning on a Hawaiian beach. It was one of the rare photos in which Frost had seen Jess smiling. Divorce didn’t change the fact that there had been happier times between them, but they were two volcanic personalities who didn’t know how to do anything except work. Sooner or later, Hayden’s ambition, and Jess’s willingness to break rules, were going to collide.

“You know I’m angry,” Hayden said, although any emotions he felt barely moved the mask of his face. “I’d be angry if this happened to any of our people, but this is personal. I loved her. What happened in the past between us doesn’t matter.”

“I’m angry, too.”

“This department will get justice for her. I will get justice for her.” He emphasized the I, as if to make sure Frost realized that he wasn’t part of the mix. This case didn’t include him.