Julie Miller - Kansas City Cowboy

“I hope you’re not preaching gloom and doom to your viewers.” Kate hiked her own purse straps higher onto her shoulder and unfastened the top button of her chocolate-brown coat, resigning herself to having this conversation. “Perhaps if you put a more positive spin on things, the department would be less cautious about sharing their information with you.”

“I don’t preach. I tell the facts. But I need some facts to talk about.”

Kate glanced over at the late-afternoon bustle of activity in and around the detectives’ cubicles. The door to the boardroom where the task force was gathering had already closed. There was no way she could indulge herself and pass off this inevitable chat with Vanessa Owen to someone else. She unfastened two more buttons on her trench coat, buying a few seconds to consider what she could say that wouldn’t compromise the investigation, yet would get her onetime friend out of her hair. “You want facts? We’re working on the serial rapist case, around the clock, utilizing experts from every department.”

“Blah, blah, blah. That’s rhetoric from the commissioner’s office and Chief Taylor, and you know it. I want the scoop from the task force, from the detectives who are on the front line of this investigation.”

Kate turned her head to the side and inhaled a deep breath to chill her temper. This woman had a lot of nerve. But she didn’t get to ruffle Kate’s composure. Not anymore. “Have you ever not gotten what you wanted, Vanessa?”

She could sense the let’s-keep-our-personal-lives-out-of-it argument forming on the other woman’s expression again. Kate didn’t want to hear it.

“Fine. Just know that whatever I share with you I’ll have to tell Gabriel Knight and the rest of the press following the investigation. The department can’t show favoritism to one media outlet over another.”

“Not a problem.” Vanessa smiled and raised her phone again, apparently relishing the victory of besting a former sorority sister again. “I’m listening. I can still get my report on the late news. Knight will have to wait until morning for his paper to come out.”

Funny how that competitive spirit had once challenged Kate to accomplish so much. And all the time she’d been busy accomplishing, Vanessa had been stealing behind Kate’s back, having an affair with her husband, Brad.

Just give her a quote and get her out of here .

But while the embers of regret and resentment burned inside her, outwardly, Kate presented a few nuggets of information as succinctly as her position within the department demanded. “While we don’t have a definitive suspect yet, we are developing a profile. He’s someone local because he knows the city well enough to blend in or hide without drawing attention to himself. And he targets strong, professional women—whether they’re up and coming or have already established successful careers.”

Vanessa’s thumbs hovered above her phone in mid-text. “So he’s looking for women who are likely to fight back or who have the means to prosecute him should he ever be identified?” She resumed inputting Kate’s comments into her phone. “This guy likes a challenge.”

“Which is part of why he goes to such lengths to hide his identity and mask the site of the original attacks.”

“Part of the reason?”

Kate checked her watch. Unless someone else was running late, Spencer Montgomery had already started the task force debriefing on the day’s events. But leaving Vanessa with an unanswered question would only encourage the woman to come back.

She knew better than to publicize the unsub’s penchant for sterilizing both the victims and the crime scene after the rape had occurred—that was a fact they were keeping to themselves to help eliminate bogus hotline tips and rule out evidence from assaults committed by someone else. But she’d probably already shared more of the profile than she should. She needed to be the stronger woman here and not let her emotions dictate her interactions with this particular member of the press.

“This is off the record because we don’t have the proof yet….” She waited for Vanessa’s nod of agreement before continuing. “But after careful study of the behaviors in each of the attacks, we believe our unsub has been hurt, humiliated, possibly even abused, by an important woman in his life. The assaults are a punishment, a means to … reclaim his power, to prove that he’s stronger, smarter, than the woman who damaged him. Unfortunately, the attacks probably have nothing to do with the actual victims. In his mind, they all represent this one woman to him. He’s proving to himself that she lacks the power to ever hurt him again.”

At least Vanessa had the grace to look appalled and slightly terrified of Kate’s description of the monster who was preying on the women of Kansas City. “And do you have a list of suspects who fit that description?”

But Kate had said enough. “I have a meeting to get to. If you’ll excuse me.”

With a noisy huff of exasperation, Vanessa fell into step beside her again. “That’s it? Psychological mumbo-jumbo about a man you’re no closer to identifying than you were five months ago?”

“We’re making progress, Vanessa, but that’s all I can share right now.”

“Can I at least tell my viewers that professional women are more likely to be targeted than others? You’re talking about assertive women—confident, successful women, right?”

Kate stopped and looked Vanessa straight in the eye. The implication was obvious. “Yes. Women like you and me.”

After a momentary pause, Vanessa nodded. “Thank you for the insight, Kate. I’ll share the warning, along with the safety tips you gave at the press conference this morning. I’m glad we can move past what happened between us and do what’s right for the greater good of the city.”

Well, at least one of them had evidently moved on from the tragic events that had ended Kate’s marriage. Even though the humiliation and pain of just how she’d discovered Brad and Vanessa’s affair had dulled over the past five years, a big scar remained on Kate’s ability to trust in personal relationships. She certainly no longer believed in the friendship she and Vanessa had shared.

Without further comment, she turned her back on the reporter. Once Kate was alone in the empty hallway, her shoulders sagged with the need to catch a quiet moment to herself before she joined the task force meeting. She untied the belt of her coat and unhooked another button. The high heels would go next if she had another five minutes to decompress. But, “Oh, hell.”

The door to her office was already open. Had she forgotten an appointment? She hurried the last few steps, then halted in the doorway.

“Oh, double …” She swallowed the rest of her unladylike curse as the sheriff with the coal-black hair unfolded himself from one of the visitor’s chairs and stood.

“Dr. Kate.” Holding his hat in his big hands, Boone Harrison nodded a greeting to her. With his insulated jacket draped over the back of the chair, she got a better idea of how broad shoulders and solid muscles filled out the dimensions of the tan-and-brown uniform he wore. The silver in his hair indicated he might be five to ten years older than she, but there was nothing over the hill about the fitness of his body, and he seemed as comfortable in his own skin, and as laid-back about the authority he exuded, as any man she’d met.

There was something basic and unpretentious about the masculinity imprinted in every rugged line, deep-pitched word and chivalrous gesture of Boone Harrison. And as much as his relentless and poorly timed refusal to leave her and KCPD alone to do their work annoyed her, she couldn’t deny a rusty feminine awareness sparking to life inside her at every encounter with the man.