Marie Ferrarella - Cavanaugh Cold Case

“What, you being sought after?” she asked. “Actually, yes, very.”

The woman had a smart mouth, and he found himself wanting to shut it in the most effective way. Later, he promised himself. He’d get to that later. It would serve as a reward for a job well done. “I was talking about the fact that there was a male in the group,” he told her.

Kristin shrugged. He had a point—not that she would say so to him. “Maybe our one male was a transvestite and managed to fool the killer. Oh, and there’s one more thing,” she said, leaving the best for last.

“Go ahead,” he urged gamely.

“The bodies weren’t hacked apart.” At least, not the ones she’d had time to assemble. She’d examined those sections very closely.

“So they weren’t murdered in a fit of rage.”

Waiting a beat, Kristin gave him the second part of her findings. “They were broken apart—while the victims were alive.”

“Then they were murdered in a fit of rage,” he said, amending his previous statement. And then he looked at her with a touch of impatience. “Well, which is it?”

Her eyes met his, and just for a split second, Kristin caught herself losing her train of thought.

Rousing herself again, she went on to tell him, “I just present you with the facts as I find them. It’s up to you to do the speculation.”

With that, she lowered her visor and got back to the business at hand, putting together ten dismembered Humpty Dumpties.

Feeling almost as if he was experiencing whiplash, Malloy watched her work for a moment. This case was definitely not going to be easy—for a hell of a lot of reasons, he told himself.

Chapter 4 Contents Cover Introduction “You may just have found our first genuine break in this case, Doc,” Malloy declared with enthusiasm. “You’re welcome,” Kristin murmured as she lowered her eyes back to the partially reconstructed skeleton on the table before her. Which was why she failed to be prepared for what came next. By the time she realized what was happening, it was too late. Caught up in the moment, Malloy bracketed her shoulders between his hands and delivered a very enthusiastic and yet innocent kiss to her cheek. The next second, he had released her and quickly crossed the floor, getting halfway to the door. “I’ll get back to you,” he promised half a second before he was gone. Kristin stared at the opened door, stunned. Half of her was hoping that he would live up to his promise—and half of her really hoped that he wouldn’t. * * * Be sure to check out the next books in this exciting series: Cavanaugh Justice — Where Aurora’s finest are always in action… Title Page Cavanaugh Cold Case Marie Ferrarella www.millsandboon.co.uk About the Author USA TODAY bestselling and RITA® Award–winning author MARIE FERRARELLA has written more than two hundred and fifty books for Mills & Boon, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide. Visit her website, www.marieferrarella.com . Dedication To Reta Renner Who Can Pronounce Cacti and Succulent Names That Make My Tongue Ache Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Epilogue Extract Copyright

Kristin could feel the detective’s eyes on her. Ordinarily, she could block out her surroundings and work under any conditions, adverse or not. But she had this distinct impression that the detective wasn’t watching her work, he was watching her, which was something else entirely.

And she didn’t much like it.

“Why are you still here?” she asked, not giving the man the satisfaction of looking up at him as she posed the question.

Malloy’s voice was mellow and easygoing as he replied, “I thought I’d broaden my education. You know, you can really learn a lot about a person by watching them work.”

Obviously the man’s supply of lines was endless, Kristin thought reprovingly. Since ignoring him was obviously not working, she decided to put Cavanaugh on the spot instead.

“Oh?” she said skeptically. “And what is it that you’ve learned by watching so intently?”

“That you’re precise and meticulous—and you don’t like being observed.”

“I don’t mind being observed. What I mind is the person doing the observing—especially when he should be working.” The look she gave him left no doubts about how she felt about his standing there.

Rather than backing away because he’d been rebuked, Malloy smiled engagingly. “Do I make you nervous, Dr. Kris?”

“You make me irritated, Detective Cavanaugh,” Kristin corrected. “Now, if you want me to come up with some answers for you to work with, you’re going to have to let me do my job,” she said, then added with finality, “alone.”

But rather than leave, the way he had initially begun to do, Malloy looked around at the other exam tables. There were six in all, brought in during the rampage of another serial killer several years ago. Now the tables were covered with bones that might or might not be part of the person whose skull rested at the top of each table.

As he glanced around at the various clusters of remains, a thought occurred to Malloy. “Do you think this might be related to a sex trafficking ring or something along those lines?”

Kristin stopped working and looked up. “Excuse me?”

“You know, sex trafficking,” he repeated, then went on to elaborate in case she missed his drift. “Unsavory types smuggling young women from around the world for the single purpose of making money by turning them into sex slaves.”

“That would be more profitable if they were alive,” she pointed out dryly as she got back to sorting. “For most men, dead women are not a turn-on.”

“Very true,” Malloy agreed amicably enough. “But maybe something went really wrong, and whoever was in charge of this group decided he or they had no other recourse except to kill all these women.”

Under normal circumstances, she supposed that the sexy detective’s theory was plausible enough. But not in this case. “There’s just one thing wrong with that,” Kristin said flatly.

“I’m all ears.”

No, he wasn’t. He was a great deal more than that, Kristin thought grudgingly. Malloy Cavanaugh was all broad shoulders, a quirky, sexy smile and whimsical green eyes that she found vastly disturbing when they were turned on her.

Her unbidden observation came out of nowhere, and she tried to banish it back to the same location, but without much success.

This whole case was making her tired.

“These women weren’t smuggled in from outside the country.”

The facts, Kris, deal with the facts. The scientific ones. It’s the only way you’re going to get him to go away.

“How do you know that?” Malloy asked, rounding the exam table in order to see what she was talking about.

Kristin drew in a breath. Cavanaugh was standing way too close to her, but telling him to back off might start him thinking the wrong thing—or the right thing, as was the case. She decided it was best to keep silent on that score. The sooner she got him to leave, the better.

“Their teeth,” she pointed out. “The ones who have had dental work done show that whoever worked on them did a decent job. The others just have good teeth. That isn’t usually the case for those whose backgrounds include poverty and malnutrition.”

He had an adequate enough imagination, but it was hard for him to envision the remains that were arranged on the exam tables once being living, breathing women.

“So it’s your opinion that this little band of not-so-merry women was homegrown?”