She rested her elbow on the corner of the detective’s desk and leaned in, dropping her voice to a whisper. “You understand that I don’t always see evidence in the same way you do, Mr. Banning.”

His green eyes filled with skepticism. “So I’ve heard.”

“I don’t dream this stuff up, Detective. I possess a psychic ability to sense things. When I put my mind to it, I can see things especially clearly. When I touch people or objects, I pick up emotions, memories—”

“You predict the future.”

Kelsey bristled. “Look, Banning, do you want to know what I saw or not?” She waited for his prompt to continue. “I believe I’ve accidentally come across an object that has something to do with one of those prostitutes who’ve been murdered around Christmas and New Year’s over the past decade.”

“Nine murders in eleven years,” he clarified. “Don’t tell me you’ve found the murder weapon?”

“No. But it’s something one of the victims touched. I’m sure of that.”

“So you’ve found some object that somebody touched, and you think it will solve the case for us?”

Mr. Uptight, Suit-’n’-Tie wasn’t going to cut her a break, but she wasn’t about to back down. Lives were at stake!

Partner-Protector
Julie Miller

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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For Denise O’Sullivan.

I’ve worked with many people at Harlequin over the years, but you’ve always been there—on the front line or in the background, watching over me like a guardian angel.

We share a love for Intrigue and dark, tortured heroes. You answer my rambling e-mails kindly and precisely. You don’t see anything wrong with my penchant for blowing up things and stabbing people <g>.

And you taught me the valuable lesson that it’s all about the reader.

Thank you.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Julie Miller attributes her passion for writing romance to all those fairy tales she read growing up, and shyness. Encouragement from her family to write down all those feelings she couldn’t express became a love for the written word. She gets continued support from her fellow members of the Prairieland Romance Writers, where she serves as the resident “grammar goddess.” This award-winning author and teacher has published several paranormal romances. Inspired by the likes of Agatha Christie and Encyclopedia Brown, Ms. Miller believes the only thing better than a good mystery is a good romance.

Born and raised in Missouri, she now lives in Nebraska with her husband, son and smiling guard dog, Maxie. Write to Julie at PZ. Box 5162, Grand Island, NE 68802-5162.

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Detective Thomas Merle Banning—Once the rookie computer geek of the Fourth Precinct, brains, hard work and a couple of gunshot wounds had finally earned him some respect. So why was he being partnered with a psychic consultant to solve a cold-case murder? And why did somebody want her dead?

Kelsey Ryan—The Flake. With a nickname like that, how could anyone, especially the cops, believe she’d “seen” a grisly murder?

Rev. Ulysses Wingate—He runs a mission in downtown Kansas City for those in need.

Doc Siegel—Someone has to graduate at the bottom of the class.

Zero—A prince among pimps. Or so he claims. His girls might have a different opinion.

Rebecca Page—The crime beat reporter wants to finish the story her father never could.

Patrick Halliwell—He gave money to reputable causes. And some not so reputable.

Ed Watkins—He’d worked the Fourth Precinct for a lot of years.

Jezebel—Eleven years ago, she’d known how to show a man a good time. She’d paid for her expertise with her life.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Epilogue

Prologue

“I beg you. Please. Don’t.”

She backed away as far as she could go, giving a soft, startled yelp when she hit the hard, dark wall. Trapped.

Splinters of rough wood caught in her hair, scratched the bare skin of her shoulders. She crossed her arms in front of her, but there was no place to hide, no way to shield herself.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know there were rules.”

But there were no words to placate the anger she saw, no words to assuage the hatred. She was cold. Shaking. Crying.

He was coming.

“Sorry about the gift, big boy.” Fear dulled her reasoning, made her grasp at the first thought that flashed in her mind. “Big boy. You like that?” She reached out, but he wouldn’t take her hand. She curled the rejected fingers into her fist and clutched it over her naked breast.

She tried to smile, but her lips quivered. The tears kept falling. The wall was cutting into her back and she was afraid.

“I can call you that. Big boy. I can do whatever you want.”

Her breath caught in her chest and couldn’t seem to get past her pounding heart. He didn’t care. She’d laughed.

She shouldn’t have laughed.

“Most men bring cash. I didn’t understand. I’m surprised, that’s all. It doesn’t mean I don’t like it. I can learn to appreciate it.”

He caressed her face. She jerked her head to the side, hating his touch. Her cheek scraped against the unfinished wood. The pungent smells of cold and rot stung her nose. His finger traced a gentle path down her neck, over her breast. Such a loving caress. She nearly gagged.

She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to go to that distant place inside her head she always went when men touched her. But she couldn’t find it. He was talking now. She couldn’t make out the words. She was cold and shaking and naked and so afraid.

She had to make this right.

Her life depended on it.

She bit her lips to bring their color back. She lowered her arms to show him everything he’d come for. She dropped her voice to a husky pitch that had seduced before.

She looked up into his shadowed expression. “Just tell me what you want. Anything you want. I’ll do it. No charge.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a scarf. It was long and narrow, tattered as if it had come from an old woman’s attic or a flea market. Its mustard-yellow trim and fuschia dots were the only colors that registered in the darkness.

Mustard and fuschia, with the hard wall cutting into her back and his nonsense words condemning her.

The damn thing was ugly. But she didn’t look away.

She held her breath as he let it unfurl, shivered as the silk slid over her breasts.

“That’s pretty,” she lied. “Is that for me, too?”

Her entire body jerked at the exact moment she realized it wasn’t another gift.

“No!”

Suddenly it was too dark to see anything, to know anything beyond the pain that clutched at her throat. She pounded her fists. She twisted. She fought.

Scratches flayed open as he shoved her brutally against the wall. Her hair tangled in the wood’s coarse texture and ripped from her scalp.

As darkness closed in, fear dragged her down into its frigid grasp. Her screams gurgled in her throat. Her windpipe snapped. Starved for oxygen, her lungs imploded. Lights danced before her eyes. Her knees buckled. Blackness caved in all around her.

No more pain.

“Wake up! Wake up!”

Kelsey Ryan was clawing at her own throat when the voiceless words roused her from her nightmare.

Only, she knew it was no nightmare.

She snapped her eyes open and looked straight into two round, dark eyes, a black nose and a pair of paws on the pillow beside her. “Frosty?”

Real dog. Real time. Real world.

Not dead.

Kelsey grabbed the miniature poodle and sat up, hugging him tight, burying her nose in the soft mop of silver curls atop his head and inhaling his familiar scent. The rasp of his friendly tongue along her jaw and neck warmed the winter chill that clung to her skin.

“Did I scare you, sweetie?” She swiped her spiky bangs from her eyes and leaned over to turn on the lamp beside her bed. No wonder her faithful guardian had been so concerned. She’d trashed half her room this time. “Mama’s sorry. I’m okay.”

She kissed his furry head, then set him on the floor. Her reassurance was apparently all he needed to hear before trotting back to whatever chair or rug he’d deemed his bed for the night.

Kelsey untangled her legs from the wedge of sheets she’d thrashed between her legs and climbed out of bed. The late December deep freeze radiated from the polished wood floor through her stockinged feet. But even bundled in the gray sweats she wore for pajamas, she knew she wouldn’t feel warm any time soon.

She righted the clock that had tipped over. Three-thirteen in the morning. Hopefully, she hadn’t screamed out loud. Not that her retirement age neighbors paid her too much mind. As long as she kept her sidewalk shoveled in the winter and her yard trimmed in the summer, they seemed content to leave her alone in her cottage-style house in an old neighborhood on the north side of Kansas City.

Still, a random scream in the dark of night…

Wave after wave of shivers cascaded down Kelsey’s spine. She squeezed her eyes shut tight and hugged herself, trying to block out the memories. But they wouldn’t stop. She pursed her lips and breathed deeply, but the remembered terror wouldn’t go away.

There’d been nothing random about what she’d sensed.

She’d felt that woman’s pain.

She’d lived that woman’s fear.

She’d seen that woman’s death.

A crushing sense of destiny opened Kelsey’s eyes. Something had triggered that episode. She had to find it.

Moving quickly now, she methodically put her room back in order. Her eyes burned with unshed tears as she waited for the inevitable attack.

Kelsey picked up the wad of blanket she’d kicked to the floor, and tucked in the sheet she’d ripped from the corner of the mattress. After retrieving the pillow she’d tossed against the wall, she picked up the dolls that had toppled over on the nightstand where she displayed them. She must have knocked them over when, barely awake, she’d reached for a tissue in the middle of the night.

One by one, she stood her little treasures up and rearranged them. The porcelain-head doll her grandmother had sewn such exquisite dresses for. The brocaded Beast doll she’d made herself with paints and thread and love. The fairy-tale princess—a Christmas present to herself—she’d found in an antique shop to go with him.

Kelsey picked up the princess by her narrow waist.

Cold. Fear. Pain. “Help me!” Death.

The same bombardment of words and images jerked through her.

She dropped the doll as if her fingers had been burned.

It lay on the bed now, a seemingly innocent package of old silk and beads and embroidery. She stared at it. Hard. Knowing what she must do. Hating it.

Gandalf the Grey hadn’t dreaded touching the One Ring as much as she was loathe to touch that doll again. But she pulled the afghan from the foot of the bed and tossed it over the doll. Careful not to touch it directly, she carried it into the kitchen, dug the box it had come in out of the trash and carefully placed it inside.

Then, with every light in the kitchen blazing, she pulled out the phone book and looked up a number. The call could wait until morning, but there’d be fewer people around to laugh this time of night.

She knew that woman had been all alone. Wouldn’t be missed.

Kelsey understood the feeling without having to see it in a dream or vision or impression.

That meant she was the only one who could help.

Conscience, and a promise to her grandmother said she must.

Pushing aside her own fears and stiffening her spine, Kelsey took a deep, fortifying breath and dialed.

“K.C.P.D. Crime Hot Line,” a tired, bored voice answered.

Not for the first time in her life, Kelsey wondered why she’d been cursed.

“I’d like to report a murder.”

Chapter One

“You’re assigning me to The Flake?”

Detective Thomas Merle Banning stared across the office at his captain, Mitch Taylor. Nice back-to-work-after-Christmas present.

Yeah, right.

“Actually, I’m assigning her to you.” The distinction wasn’t any comfort. “You’re the detective, she’s the departmental consultant.”

“She’s the nutcase everybody jokes about in the coffee room.”

“Nonetheless, she’s expecting to meet with you later this morning.”

How the hell had he gotten so lucky? He no longer had anything to prove, did he? His arrest record was solid, his aim good enough to earn a marksman’s pin, his reports spotless down to the minutest detail. And no one who knew him—with two rare exceptions—dared call him nerdy Merle to his face anymore. He’d long since outgrown terms like rookie and computer geek.

But this smacked of some kind of practical joke or penance.

“Why don’t you just shoot me now and put me out of my misery?” He marched across the room in his determined, rolling stride and faced Mitch across his desk. “I thought you were putting me on the cold-case detail for the next few months while Ginny’s on maternity leave.”

“I am.”

“Then put me on a desk. Let me work. Don’t waste my time with this woman.”

“This woman believes she’s seen something that can help one of those cases.”

With his regular partner, Ginny Rafferty-Taylor, assigned to extended bed rest for the last trimester of her pregnancy, Merle had already been taken off the active homicide investigation team and relegated to sorting through boxes of dead-end cases. He hadn’t argued the reassignment because Captain Taylor had played to his ego, telling him he had a real knack for uncovering details others missed and patiently piecing together random clues to complete investigative puzzles.

But no amount of ego stroking was going to make this right. He worked with the smartest, prettiest, classiest woman on the planet. Not UFO-chasing, crystal-ball-reading, hocus-pocus crackpots. It was hard enough to lose Ginny. But to let another woman try to take her place as his partner?

Make that departmental consultant.

Merle scrubbed his palm across his clean-shaven jaw and shrugged. “The Flake?”

“She has a name.” Captain Taylor’s resonant voice reprimanded him like the father he’d lost so long ago. “Kelsey Ryan. She has a degree in criminal justice studies and teaches a course in psychic forensic science over at University of Missouri-Kansas City.”

Psychic science? Wasn’t that some kind of oxymoron? “What the hell is that? Since when does K.C.P.D. rely on psychobabble to solve cases? She’s nothing but a PR nightmare. No one will take me seriously if she’s attached to me. I’d rather work alone.”

He pulled back the front of his tweed jacket and shoved his hands into the pockets of his khaki slacks, pacing the confines of the small office. The twinge in his right knee was more pronounced with the bitter temperatures plaguing the city these past few weeks. But pain was just something a mature man lived with. Banning had been on the force for seven years now, had been a detective for five. He’d long since outgrown his naive new kid on the block status.

Taking a couple of bullets that left his body scarred and his soul ancient beyond his twenty-nine years did that to a man.

In those seven years of service, he’d unholstered his weapon only twice while on duty. He’d been forced to kill a man each time.

Those were the kinds of odds that sobered a man’s way of thinking. Made him understand the value of cold, hard facts and leaving nothing to chance.

That’s why this made no sense.

He stopped and looked into his superior’s sage brown eyes. “Why me, Captain?”

For such a big, robust man, Mitch Taylor was surprisingly gentle as he adjusted the framed picture of his wife and young son on the desk in front of him. When he sat down, Merle took the clue and eased into a chair on the opposite side. The old man wanted to talk, and Merle had learned it paid to listen to the veteran cop.

“One thing I’ve learned about you over the years, Banning, is that you’re smart. You don’t just learn from your books and computers, but from people. From mistakes and successes, your own and others’. I’m counting on the fact you might be willing to learn something from Ms. Ryan, too.” The captain nodded toward the blind-covered windows that separated his office from the rows of desks and cubicles that formed the Fourth Precinct detective division. “I can name at least a half-dozen men out there who’d just brush her aside. But I can count on you to be gentleman enough not to laugh in her face when she tells her story.”

Merle couldn’t stop the sarcasm from bleeding into his voice. “You want me to work with her because my mother taught me good manners?”

“Someone has to talk to her. Take her statement, at the very least. If there’s any credibility to what she has to say, I know you’ll be fair.”

The captain thought Kelsey Ryan was that important? Or was this more ego stroking to bribe him into taking a job nobody else wanted? He still wasn’t about to accept this assignment wholeheartedly, but there was a certain wisdom in pleasing the boss. “All I have to do is take her statement?”

Captain Taylor nodded. “She claims she can help with the Holiday Hooker murders.”

“Let me guess. She thinks she was a hooker in another life.”

That one actually made the old man smile. “Don’t dismiss her yet. We can’t afford to alienate any citizen right now.” He shoved this morning’s Kansas City Star newspaper across the desk and pointed to a headline near the bottom of the front page.

K.C.P.D. No Closer To IDing Remains Of Infant Girl

“Ouch.” The discovery of a baby Jane Doe’s body in one of the area landfills more than two months ago had galvanized the entire department from homicide to missing persons to traffic cops. Every man and woman on the force seemed to take it personally that that child had been killed. But even the special task force assigned to the investigation had been thus far unable to put together many leads.

“Ouch is right.” Captain Taylor boxed up his emotions and set them aside the same way Merle had to. “The new commissioner, Shauna Cartwright, is desperate for some good press for a change. She’s ordered us to pay attention to every report that comes in. And to solve some cases.”

“So meeting with Kelsey Ryan would be doing a favor for the commissioner?”

“You’d be doing a favor for me.”

“All right, then.” It was enough that Mitch Taylor had asked him to do this. That the captain trusted he was the best man for the assignment—even if it was a lousy one. And hell, his hide was thick enough to withstand a little razzing from his peers.

Merle pushed to his feet, adjusting his jacket over the badge and gun clipped to his belt. “I’m off to make headlines for the department.”

“Just make sure they’re good ones.”

“Yes, sir.” Before leaving, Merle paused, exhaling caution on one overly curious breath. “How is Ginny doing?”

Mitch might have inside information on the petite blond detective. He was more than Ginny’s boss. He was her cousin-in-law and her husband’s best friend. They were all part of a big, happy family that Merle could hang out with and admire, but never truly be part of.

Mitch didn’t know his secret. Didn’t even question Merle’s interest. After all, it was perfectly normal for a cop to inquire about his partner’s health and well-being. “She’s fine. These last three months on total bed rest is driving her nuts, but Brett’s keeping a close eye on her to make sure she does everything the doctor says.” God, how that big brute loved his wife.

Just as Merle loved her.

But he was nothing more than Ginny’s friend. The kid brother she’d never had. His feelings were anything but brotherly for his detective partner. But she loved somebody else.

Merle nodded, breathing through the pain with a smile, hiding much more than Mitch or anyone else would ever guess. “Give her my best when you see her.”

“Why don’t you stop by? She’d love to see you. Hell. According to Brett, she’d love to see anybody.”

Merle laughed right along with him. “I’ll do that.”

The phone on Captain Taylor’s desk rang. He put up one finger, ordering Merle not to leave quite yet. He picked up the receiver. “Yeah, Maggie?” His gaze shot to Merle’s. The call had something to do with him. “I’ll tell him.”

Merle splayed his hands at his hips, waiting as the captain hung up the phone and stood. He tilted his chin ever so slightly to maintain eye contact with the bigger man. “What’s up?”

Was that a smirk? The captain’s barrel chest heaved with a sigh. “If nothing else, your flake is punctual. Maggie says Ms. Ryan just checked in. She’s waiting for you at your desk.”

Merle crossed to the blinds and peeked out, needing a moment to gather the gentlemanly composure Captain Taylor thought he had in such abundant supply. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

He’d seen her in grainy black-and-white news photos, and in caricatures scribbled onto notepads. But nothing had prepared him for the real thing.

He saw her hair first. It stuck out from the crown in an explosion of short, flamboyant curls, with little wisps spiking around her ears and onto her cheekbones and neck. A sweep of bangs curled down over her forehead, flirting with her eyebrows and parting to one side as she pushed them off her face with the tips of her turquoise-gloved fingers.

But the gelled, pop-star style wasn’t the most noticeable thing. It was the color. Red. Not copper. Not auburn. But a flashy, unnatural tint that reminded him of rubies and fire engines and flagging down ships.

A quick scan farther down her body indicated that subtlety just wasn’t part of her vocabulary. Her knee-length, black-and-white checked coat hung open. A knitted scarf of bright turquoise draped around her neck and clashed with the electric-blue, snowman-patterned sweater she wore over a long denim skirt and clunky black lace-up boots.

Her cheeks and nose were flushed from the cold and wind outside. But instead of huddling her posture for warmth, she sat ramrod straight, shamelessly glancing all around the office and taking note of everybody’s business.

But there was a sharpness to her light brown eyes that conveyed more than nosy curiosity. She was gauging distances, occupations, degrees of interest in her presence the way any con artist would upon entering a den of cops.

There was a hint of arrogance about her, a defiance that surprised him.

Kelsey Ryan didn’t want to talk to him any more than he wanted to talk to her.

Merle frowned. He didn’t know whether he felt relieved or insulted by that observation.

“Is something wrong?” asked Mitch.

Oh, yeah. But this was for the commissioner. For good press. For Captain Taylor. Out loud, Merle said the only thing he could. “No, sir.”

He adjusted his tie as if donning a suit of armor.

Then he opened the door.

BROOKS BROTHERS. Ten o’clock.

Kelsey kept her body facing straight ahead, but turned her eyes to watch the man approach.

Khaki slacks. Navy tweed blazer. Maroon silk tie. Dark blond hair cut too short for any strand to be out of place. Chiseled features cleanly shaven and devoid of humor. Trim, evenly-proportioned build from broad shoulders to slim hips. A coiled strength to his stride to hide the hitch in every step.

The little frisson of awareness that shimmied down her spine was inconsequential.

This guy was too neat. Too clean. Too buttoned down and under control to be open-minded at all.

Ho boy.

He was the worst kind of cop to tell her story to. Not that any of them in her limited experience had been gung ho about taking her talent seriously.

Still, that woman last night had been so alone.

For a few seconds last night, Kelsey had shared her stark, hopeless terror.

That woman had no one but Kelsey to help her. To remember.

As the detective neared the desk, she guessed him to be about six foot, maybe half a foot taller than herself. And despite the slight smile that touched the corners of his mouth, she didn’t sense that he’d gotten any friendlier since stepping out of that office. Kelsey rose to meet him, instinctively clutching at the crystal pendant hanging beneath her sweater and camisole, warming her skin.

“Detective Banning?”

He nodded and extended his hand. “Ms. Ryan.”

Since she still wore her turquoise gloves, she didn’t hesitate to clasp his hand and exchange a polite, professional greeting. It might be the only civility she’d find here this morning.

“Have a seat.” He gestured to the straight-backed chair beside his desk, then sat in his own chair and pivoted to face her. “So you found out something about the Holiday Hooker murders you’d like to report?”

Kelsey glanced down at the black leather backpack propped beside her chair and thought of the box with its well-wrapped doll tucked away inside. She wanted to hand over the tragic object with all its hate-filled psychic residue and get its poisonous influence out of her life.

But that would be disloyal to that sad, frightened woman whom she’d gotten to know so well in her last few seconds of existence.

Kelsey’s grandmother had taught her to use her curse as a gift. Grandma Lucy Belle had said that by helping others who couldn’t be helped in any other way, her inherited talent would feel less like a burden. Kelsey’s grandmother had been so wise. So loving. She wouldn’t disappoint the faith Lucy Belle had had in her.

Detective Banning was watching her with more politeness than patience when she looked up. Letting the calmness of the blue crystal pendant her grandmother had given her work its spell over her nerves, Kelsey took a deep breath. She rested her elbow on the corner of the detective’s desk and leaned in, dropping her voice to a whisper. “You understand that I don’t always see evidence in the same way you do, Mr. Banning.”

His green eyes filled with skepticism. “So I’ve heard.” He thumbed through some papers on his desk, but she had a feeling he wasn’t reading any of them. “Captain Taylor tells me you had a dream about a murder last night, and called it in.”

Kelsey sat back, disappointed, but not surprised by his misinformation.

“I don’t dream this stuff up, Detective.” She adopted her most succinct, teaching-the-uneducated voice and explained. “I possess a psychic ability to sense things. When I put my mind to it, or when my guard is down like it was last night, I can see things especially clearly. When I touch people or objects, I pick up emotions, memories—”

“You predict the future.”

Kelsey bristled. “No. It doesn’t work like that. I can’t help you win the lottery. Sometimes I can sense what a person is thinking or feeling about the future, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. I have better luck reading the residue of something that’s already taken place in the past.”

“Luck, huh?”

Poor choice of words. She’d set herself up for that one. “Look, Banning, do you want to know what I saw or not?”

He nodded, but she didn’t see any glimmer of understanding lighting his eyes. “Okay. So you touched something last night, got a little freaky sensation and called the cops.”

Crude and suggestive, but basically accurate. Kelsey decided to let the lesson drop and continued on. “I believe I’ve accidentally come across an object that has something to do with one of those prostitutes who’ve been murdered around Christmas and New Year’s over the last decade.”

“Nine murders in eleven years,” he clarified. But he didn’t ask about the object.

She nudged her backpack with her boot, grateful for all the layers separating her from the doll’s frightening aura. “I don’t know if this is something that belonged to one of the victims or to the killer.”

His gaze dropped to the backpack, as well. “Don’t tell me you found the murder weapon?”

“No. But it’s something one of them touched. I’m sure of that.”

“So you found some object that somebody touched, and you think it will solve the case for us?”

Mr. Uptight Suit-’n-Tie wasn’t going to give her a break. “Look, I don’t presume to do your job. But since the murders haven’t been solved yet, I assumed you might appreciate a little help. I’d like a chance to explain what I know.”

He was already standing up by the time she finished her lecture. “So this could take a while, right? Why don’t I get us some coffee. How do you take yours? Black? Cream or sugar?”

Kelsey tipped her gaze up to his, refusing to be so easily dismissed. “Both, please.”

With a curt nod, he strode across the room. Kelsey watched him move. While she regrouped her tranquility and determination with some deep, even breathing, the analytical part of her mind strayed. She wondered if Detective Banning, with more control than grace in his movements, had one leg shorter than the other. And whether the stiffness of his right knee was the cause of his limp or the result of it.

She knew one way to find some answers.

But touching Merle Banning, skin to skin, wasn’t an option she wanted to pursue. Hadn’t she freaked out enough men over the years by holding hands or sharing a kiss?

Of course, she could always think about her disastrous relationship with Jeb if she ever needed a reminder about why she had no business getting involved with a man. His cruel jokes and abusive words should have been enough to kill any interest she might have in the male species.

Speaking of…

The distinctive sound of deep, male laughter diverted her attention to the break room. With the door propped open and windows forming the wall from waist to ceiling, she could see a short, bulky, uniformed officer resting his hip on the counter beside Banning and the coffeepot. Another blue-suited cop and a pair of plainclothes detectives sat at a table. Someone must have said something funny. Something teasing, something low-brow, no doubt.

The stout officer’s gaze connected with hers through the glass. Oh, no. His leering grin mocked her. As if a man with only four or five strings of hair to comb over his bald pate had any right to make fun of someone else. He took his leisurely time and finally turned his back to her. Maybe he didn’t care that he’d been caught, or maybe he felt he’d already had the last laugh at her expense.

And was that…? Yes. Kelsey’s stomach twisted into a self-conscious knot. Someone was singing an off-key rendition of the theme from The Twilight Zone.

Cute.

Not terribly original, but cute.

All the hurts and insults and accusations she’d endured throughout her life burned with a molten intensity in her veins. Some days, it seemed that defensive anger was the only thing that could keep her warm.

Today was one of those days.

She watched the interchange unfold in the break room without hearing the words. But she didn’t need to. One didn’t grow up different from everyone else without knowing when someone was calling you “The Flake” or “crazy” or “delusional.” It was too easy for people to ridicule what they didn’t understand. Most of the time she was patient with them, but not today. Not after what she’d seen and felt last night.

She’d been so cold. So scared.

She’d felt that woman’s death.

Kelsey tugged her coat together at her neck and shivered inside, trying to hold on to her anger. But the fear was more powerful. She had to do something. She had to tell someone.

As if sensing her fight-or-flight instincts kicking in, Detective Banning turned. Green eyes met brown through the glass. For a few unguarded seconds, Kelsey held on to his gaze, wanting to answer the question there, wondering if she was imagining the concern.

With a blink, his gaze moved past her. Kelsey’s breath seeped out on a sigh. She felt strangely bereft, as if denied something precious almost within her reach.

Banning said something to one of the detectives at the table. The singing stopped amidst another round of laughter. To his credit, Banning wasn’t laughing. A champion? He barely knew her. Just a nice guy, telling his buddies not to make fun where she could see them? Small consolation. Or was he embarrassed that they could see her sitting at his desk, linking them together, no matter how impersonally?

Jeb had been embarrassed.

Just like that, the anger was back. Screw this. There had to be someone else in this city she could talk to.

Kelsey stood, adjusted her skirt down to her calves. She slipped her backpack over one shoulder and started buttoning her coat as she zigzagged between the desks and headed straight for the bank of elevators that would take her back down to the street and out into the freezing cold.

“Hey!” She pretended she didn’t recognize the voice, and that he wasn’t calling to her. He’d be glad if she could slip out and never darken his desk again.

She had the elevator button in sight when a band of fingers closed around her arm, just above the elbow. Kelsey jumped.

“Whoa.” Banning quickly released her, holding his hand up in surrender as she jerked around. She didn’t bother with a Don’t touch me. He probably got that idea loud and clear from her startled, chest-clutching reaction. “Where are you going? We’re just getting started.” He held up the two steaming plastic cups he balanced in his left hand. “Coffee?”

Kelsey stared at the cups for a senseless moment, then tipped her chin to look up at him. “No, thank you, Mr. Banning. We’re finished.” Her voice sounded surprisingly succinct as she pushed it past the pounding pulse in her throat. “Hard as this might be for you to believe, my time is valuable. I’m here for a legitimate reason. I saw a woman murdered. I do not make up stories, and I will not be ridiculed by you, your friends or anybody else.”

She spun toward the elevators, but he brushed past her in an eclectic whiff of wool and spice and overbrewed coffee to block her path. “Then let’s get out of here.”

Kelsey stopped short, lifting her gaze above his starched white collar and the jut of his chin. “Embarrassed to be seen with The Flake?”

He didn’t deny the nickname or the embarrassment. But he did offer an unexpected argument. “Well, that hair does draw a lot of attention. I’m assuming it’s not your natural color?”

Was that a serious question, or was he teasing her? The confusion was enough to defuse her temper. She simply explained the color choice. “I get good vibes from red.”

“I always wondered why women dyed their hair. It’s the vibes, huh?”

He thrust his wrist from the end of his sleeve and checked his watch. His jacket veed open, giving her a glimpse of the brass and blue enamel badge clipped to his belt beside the brown leather holster at his hip. The weapon inside was a sobering reminder that just because he was curious or teasing or polite, he was not her friend.

“You eat lunch?” he asked.

“On most days. I am human and do require sustenance.”

He grinned, subtracting years from the serious set of his mouth. The unexpectedly sexy result was almost as disconcerting as when he’d grabbed her arm. “I meant, have you eaten lunch today?”

“Oh.” Kelsey quickly gathered her composure. She had to think of Merle Banning as a cop, not a man. Certainly not an attractive one. “No. I haven’t eaten since last night.”

She hadn’t had the appetite to stomach food.

“Well, since I require sustenance the same way you do, let’s go grab a quick bite to eat. We can continue our conversation someplace without the audience.” He nodded his head toward the break room. “Away from those yahoos.”

Kelsey looked over shoulder and spotted the pudgy bald guy watching her again. Did he think he knew her? Should she know him? Being stared at like that, without any apology, like some sort of sideshow phenomenon, gave her the willies. The barrel-chested man, standing in the open doorway to the Captain’s office and eyeing the interaction between her and Banning like some sort of watchful guardian didn’t help, either. She quickly turned away.

She’d love to get out of here.

Kelsey nodded. “Okay. That’s fine. I need to eat before my afternoon class, anyway.”

“All right. Let me ditch these and we’ll head out.”

Kelsey refused to turn around to see where he dumped the coffee and retrieved his coat. That bald cop might still be staring at her. Well, he could look all he liked. She didn’t have to give him the satisfaction of knowing how his unwanted attention rattled her.

Going out to lunch. That almost sounded like a date.

But it wasn’t. Kelsey knew better. Men didn’t ask her out. Not ones who knew about her talent. Whether Merle Banning believed her or not, this would be a working lunch.

The weight of the bag on her shoulder multiplied with her resolute sigh, bearing down with the burden of so much more than that doll. She carried the memory of last night’s murderous vision, the responsibility of her curse—along with the crippling knowledge that, more likely than not, she would always carry that burden alone.

Chapter Two

The Jukebox, just east of the Plaza in downtown Kansas City, was a 1950s-style soda fountain and burger joint, complete with twirling bar stools, vinyl booths and waitresses with handkerchiefs pinned beneath their name tags. The decor was airy and nostalgic, the food plain and simple. The clientele was mostly retirement-age patrons revisiting their high school years, and young families with kids on Christmas vacation looking for a fast meal served on a plate.

In short, the choice was more laid-back and less uptown than she’d expect Merle Banning to make.

Either he was trying to keep things fast and easy so he could be done with her as quickly as possible, or he’d purposely taken her to an out-of-the-way place so there’d be no chance of one of his cop buddies coming in and seeing him with her.

It wouldn’t be the first time she’d been cast aside or hidden away.

At least the food was good. Hearty and filling. She couldn’t exactly say her appetite had returned, but now that she was actually doing something about the doll and the dead woman, practicality had kicked in. Her visions could be draining, physically, mentally and emotionally. She couldn’t stop the headaches, and the emotions would always haunt her. But she could maintain her physical strength, keep her body healthy even when everything else in her life was royally screwed up.

Although the thermometer registered in the single digits outside and the graded snow stood thigh-high or taller along the edges of every street and sidewalk, she’d ordered a milk shake served with the chilled metal cup it had been blended in. In between bites of her steak-burger with cheese, and thin, crunchy fries, she’d drunk and spooned her way through every last delicious drop.

She was paying for the indulgence, though. Even with the sleeves of her wool sweater pulled down to her knuckles, and her coat draped over her shoulders, she shivered with the pervasive chill that hadn’t left her since she’d crawled out of bed last night. At this rate, she wouldn’t be thawing out until summer. But she’d needed the reinforcing medicinal properties of chocolate and ice cream to sustain her.

Especially since Detective Banning’s idea of lunchtime conversation was to question every detail about her account of the psychic impression she’d shared while they’d waited for their order to arrive.

“Like a log cabin?” he asked, picking up his last onion ring and popping it into his mouth. While he chewed, he pulled a paper napkin from the dispenser on the table and carefully wiped his hands.

Kelsey swallowed her impatience. While he was being Mr. Clean and acting politely interested, she was reliving the scratchy sensation of rough wood cutting into the skin on her back. “No. It was more like a building under construction—or one being torn down. The latter, I’m guessing, because of the smell.”

He wadded up the napkin and tossed it onto his empty plate. “The smell?”

Of foreboding. The smell of dead bodies and buried secrets. But that sort of metaphorical description would surely elicit a laugh, so she stuck to more scientific facts.

“Rot. Decay. Like when the cold seeps in between the cracks and condenses. It turns moldy before it can evaporate. Slimy. This place was dark and horrible. She wasn’t familiar with it. I’m sure it wasn’t her regular place of business.”

He responded by adjusting his tie unnecessarily. His straight nose and square face reflected few lines beyond the squint marks beside his eyes. But he dressed older than his youthful face might dictate, with affluent materials and a tailored fit to his clothes. He acted older than a man of twenty-nine or thirty. Conservative. Wary. Politely distant. He carried himself older, too. Not just in the slight limp he camouflaged with a quick, rolling gait, but the way he sat across from her—straight backed, never leaning in to show trust or acceptance, never lounging back to relax.

With her self-protective need to be constantly aware of the people around her, Kelsey couldn’t help but notice other incongruent details about him.

Despite his relatively young age, Merle Banning’s hands had seen something of life. They were clean and neatly taken care of, to be sure, but they were also nicked up with scars around the knuckles and callused enough to show hard physical labor of some kind. They moved with precise efficiency at every task, from opening the front door for her to cradling his mug of hot coffee.

He seemed unaware of her subtle perusal. Or perhaps her opinion just didn’t matter to him.

“Those are pretty specific details for a crime you haven’t really seen.” He sipped his coffee, then frowned at the mug as if something about it didn’t please him.

She had a good idea it was her report which didn’t please him.

“But I have seen it,” she insisted. “That doll triggered something. Either it’s from the crime scene, or the victim touched it somewhere along the way. It carries her residue.”

“Her DNA?” Banning’s moss-colored eyes flared with mild interest.

“It’s not that concrete, Detective. It’s more of an imprint of her psyche, her consciousness. I can sense her thoughts and emotions. She was scared for her life. And I don’t think she suspected the man who killed her had that kind of violence in him. Not toward her at any rate.”

“You saw the man who did it?”

“No.” She hadn’t wanted to look that hard. She’d already felt death, she didn’t need to look it in the eye, as well.

“Do you know who the woman was?”

“No.”

“And you don’t know where the murder took place.”

Kelsey bristled at the challenge in his tone. “Apparently, you don’t know the answers to any of those questions, either, Mr. Banning, or her murder wouldn’t be relegated to the cold-case files.”

His eyes narrowed at that one.

“I know this is more of a lead than you had twelve hours ago. I’m only trying to help.” Kelsey clutched her coat more tightly around her and eyed the box she’d taken out of her backpack and slid across the table to him earlier. “I don’t know if you’ll find scientific evidence on the doll or not. But you’re welcome to keep it and send it to a lab for analysis. I certainly don’t want it anymore.”

“That’s generous of you, Ms. Ryan.” His insincerity irritated her, and it didn’t surprise her to hear him try to debunk her claim with a logical argument. “But unless you can tell me you picked that up at the murder scene, saw it used as a weapon or there’s a written confession hidden inside, it’s pretty useless to K.C.P.D.”

She sat at attention, age-old defenses rising to the fore. Lucy Belle had tried to teach her to be patient with those who didn’t understand. But she had a real problem with anyone who refused to even try. “I don’t imagine these things, Detective. I know that’s not the murder weapon. She was strangled with a long scarf.”

He nodded as if he’d caught her in a lie. “Then you’re conjuring dreams from facts you read in the newspaper and are using this doll as some sort of manifestation of them.”

“No—”

He set down his mug with a precise thud. “Or you were at that crime scene and you’re just now working up the nerve to report what you saw.”

Kelsey gripped the edge of her seat to hold on to her temper. “I have no idea where the murder took place. That’s why I tried to describe it to you in detail.”

“Or perhaps you’ve been intentionally withholding evidence on a capital crime.”

“Inten—?” She swallowed hard, then tapped out each sentence onto the table top. “I didn’t get the impression until last night. I called right after. At three in the morning I called.”

“Even if that doll was good for something, it’s so far removed from the crime scene and so tainted, it’d be worthless now.” He shoved the box back across the tabletop toward her. “So, no thanks.”

Kelsey dodged to the side, avoiding the doll as if he’d fired his gun at her. “I didn’t know it was evidence.”

“I’m not sure if you need to get some professional help, or if you just need to get a life.” He offered her an apologetic smile, arching one golden eyebrow and carving out a dimple at the side of his mouth, as if that would take the sting from his words. “But, plain and simple, Ms. Ryan, you’re wasting my valuable time on this case.”

With that, she stood up. She knocked her leather bag to the floor and spilled some of the contents. The curse she muttered was neither ladylike nor subdued. Watching her lipstick roll beneath the empty table across from them did nothing to improve her mood. This conversation was done as far as she was concerned. But so much for making a dignified, hasty exit and salvaging some semblance of her pride. Squatting down, she shoved her arms into the sleeves of her coat while she snatched up her lipstick, keys and a pen.

Detective Banning slid out of his seat to help her. She noted the tight set of his mouth as he knelt beside her, and idly wondered if his knee was giving him trouble. But Kelsey fought the sympathetic urge that would defuse her temper, grabbed the last item before he could reach it and shot to her feet. One coat sleeve caught at her elbow and tangled with the strap of her bag.

Banning rose more slowly, moving more deliberately, while she struggled to free herself. “I appreciate that you mean well and want to help, Ms. Ryan. The department always appreciates when a citizen steps forward.”

When he latched on to her collar to try to help her, she shrugged that efficient hand away and dug inside her pack. Kelsey pulled a ten dollar bill out of her bag and threw it on the table. “There. That’s for my burger and fries.”

When she turned to leave, he blocked her path. He picked up the ten dollars and tried to hand it back to her. “Lunch is on me.”

Too little, too late. “Oh, no. I insist. Heaven forbid I waste a moment of your precious time or a penny of your money, Detective. Forget the data I could have been evaluating at the lab or the class I should have been prepping for. And who’s going to go home and let my dog out now? I have to be on campus in half an hour. This was a waste of my time, Mr. Banning.”

He patted the air with a placating hand, trying to calm her before she created any more of a scene. “Keep your money. It’s not a big deal. I’ll have the department reimburse me if that’ll make you feel better.”

If Kelsey had kept hold of her temper, she would have seen it coming. She could have protected herself.

“Take it.”

He grabbed her left hand, slapped the ten-dollar bill into her palm and curled her fingers down over it, holding her loose fist between his hands. Bare hands. Skin to skin contact.

Oh, hell.

The bombardment of sensations came fast and furious. The detective continued talking, apologizing, but she heard no words. It was nothing but a hum of noise in the background as her skin burned beneath his touch. Her chest constricted and a flood of images flashed through her mind like movie clips spinning faster and faster, flying off their reel.

Banning, lying broken on the ground. So much blood. So much pain.

A tiny blond woman at the altar in a wedding gown. Longing. Sadness. Regret.

The explosion of a gun, firing over and over at a shadowy target. Such anger. Such determination.

The musky scent of sweat. Exertion. Banning’s muscles straining, harder and harder. A determined mind pushing the body beyond its limits.

A little boy at a funeral, squeezing his mother’s hand. Confusion. Grief.

T. Merle Banning, typed on a document, and a pencil, scratching out the first name. Gouging out a memory. Erasing shame.

It was the shame that got to her. Washed over her like a bucket of icy water. The emotion inside her—her own emotion—woke her, breaking the spell.

She jerked her hand away. “Let go of me.”

Still disoriented, she saw broad shoulders and a forceful chin swim in front of her eyes. Years of rote training reminded her to reach into her pockets for her gloves and quickly pull them on.

“Ms. Ryan?” She forced herself to breathe, in through her nose, out through her mouth. “Are you all right?”

Firm, gentle hands closed around her shoulders. The twin spots of warmth shocked her back to reality. She lifted her gaze past the sensuous male line of Detective Banning’s mouth to read the concern etched beside his alert, assessing eyes. A frisson of energy that was neither psychic nor temper sparked along her nerve endings. He really was a good-looking man—in a buttoned-down, just-the-facts-ma’am kind of way.

This is wrong.

Kelsey wiggled her shoulders and shook herself free from his grasp, heeding the warning voice from her conscience. “Get your hands off me, T.”

Without his touch she felt cold. Even colder than she’d been before the psychic impression had fully left her.

The chill was nothing new to her. Nor was Detective Banning’s instant withdrawal. How many other people had she freaked out with her talent? How many others would scoff at her knowledge of things a normal person wouldn’t know? He spread his hands out to either side of her, in plain sight. “Did you just call me T?”

“Isn’t that your name? T-something Banning?” She set her bag on the tabletop so she could tie her scarf and button her coat with some degree of grace and then get out of there. “Merle’s your middle name.”

“The T’s for Thomas. But nobody calls me that. And I did not tell you that was my name.”

Kelsey simply turned her face and glared, daring him to put two and two together to come up with the right explanation for her knowledge of his secret. But that wasn’t a leap of faith he was willing to make.

“I don’t know where you did your snooping, lady. But this game isn’t funny anymore. I’ve done my duty.” He pulled another ten from his wallet and laid it with hers, leaving the waitress a huge tip. Then he was slipping into his long, camel-hair coat and limping toward the exit, robbing her of the glory of walking out on him. “Have a good day, Ms. Ryan. Drive safely.”

Kelsey stared at the worn-out box he’d left on the table behind him.

How had this gotten personal? How had she gone from ultracaution to trading barbs with T. Merle Banning and letting her emotions rule her? Lesson one in Grandma Lucy Belle’s book of down-home advice was keep your eyes focused on the goal. Kelsey’s goal had been to help that poor woman. To give a forgotten murder victim a chance to find justice.

This meeting wasn’t about her, or justifying her gift, or making sense of the tumble of emotions Detective Banning stirred inside her.

Ashamed that she’d let old wounds get the better of her, Kelsey took a deep breath, grabbed the doll box and hustled after Banning, beating him to the glassed-in lobby before he could open the outer door. She planted herself squarely in his path and pleaded her case one last time. “I don’t know who that woman was. I know she was naked. She was in some falling-down, ramshackle building. I know that man strangled her. She thought the scarf was payment. A gift. Maybe the doll, too.” She held it out. He didn’t take it. “I don’t know. Putting that all together makes me think she’s one of your hookers.”

He pulled back the front of his coat and jacket, propping his hands on his hips and exposing his gun and badge. “Your point?”

She got the message. But she refused to be put off.

“I have a degree in criminal justice studies, Detective. I know police procedure. You didn’t ask me any probative questions. You spent this entire interview trying to get me to admit I’m a fraud. You didn’t write down a damn thing I told you in that notebook of yours. And now you’re going back to your office to have a good laugh with your buddies at my expense.”

“I wouldn’t—”

“You’re not the first cop to think I’m crazy. In fact, you’re more close minded than most. If you want scientific facts, you find that building. You check out the store where I bought this doll. You interview the man who sold it to me. The doll’s the key if you want to use it.” She shoved the box into the middle of his chest and backed out the door into the icy winter chill. “Now we’re done.”

T? MERLE SAT at his desk—tie loose, collar unbuttoned, sleeves rolled to the elbow. He looked as if he’d been working all afternoon, but it was an illusion. That crazy fake redhead had gotten under his skin and disrupted his concentration by saying one stupid letter!

How did she know about his past? Who had she been talking to? Could she be the disgruntled relative of one of the investors his father had cheated and abandoned twenty years ago? If so, it had to be the cleverest way he’d come up against yet for one of his father’s victims to take a strip of retribution out of his hide.

Merle stared at the data on the computer screen, seeing nothing but the capital Ts jump out at him. “How the hell…?”

Thomas Banning was the name he’d given up years ago, when he was just a boy. He’d given it up because Thomas was his father’s name. His mother stopped using it and had taken to calling him by his middle name.

Thomas had been a curse at his house.

Merle wasn’t much better. Merle was an old man’s name. A nerd’s name. Sometimes even a girl’s name. It was a name that invited teasing on elementary playgrounds and in junior high locker rooms. It was a name that high-school girls giggled at and college professors mispronounced.

It never quite fit. Yet he’d been stuck with it.

The only time he tolerated Merle without a hint of resentment was on his mother’s lips or in his partner Ginny’s sweet, succinct voice.

Thomas Merle Banning, Jr.

That was his name.

But he couldn’t use it.

She’d come close. Too damn irritatingly close.

Merle tossed his pen onto the open file in front of him and sank back into his chair with a heavy sigh. He rubbed his fingers back and forth across his chin and jaw, and tried to sort out his thoughts. He wasn’t just feeling defensive or distracted here. He had a good dose of guilt working on him, too.

The fact that Kelsey Ryan had somehow uncovered his first initial bothered him almost as much as the fact she knew he’d only been humoring her by taking her to lunch and asking a few questions. Technically, he’d obeyed Captain Taylor’s request, but he hadn’t really done his job.

Flake or not, he should have listened to her story, thanked her, then sent her on her way. Not voiced his opinion of her dubious “vision,” get her pissed and then let her storm off without so much as a thank-you or apology.

But she’d pushed his buttons. Not just the this-feels-like-a-practical-joke button. The computer geek desk jockey wants to see some action? Let him interview the wacko. Sergeant Watkins and the other guys he’d met in the break room that morning seemed to find it terribly amusing that The Flake had been assigned to him.

She looked like an overdecorated Christmas tree, said one. Take her to a New Year’s Eve party and use that hair to light off fireworks, said another. Sergeant Watkins had been even more direct. “I’m surprised the doctors let that looney out.”

For some reason, though, Merle hadn’t felt like laughing. Their crude jokes and unapologetic stares had triggered the chivalric streak inside him. He outranked the blue suits and could shut them up with a command. And he’d earned enough respect from his fellow detectives for them to honor his request to let it drop.

He hadn’t laughed because Kelsey Ryan had gotten to something deeper inside him. Maybe he saw a little of that skinny, four-eyed kid he used to be in her. The kid whose daddy had stuck a gun in his mouth and killed himself because he couldn’t repay the funds he’d embezzled or face the consequences of his actions. He’d been the kid who hid behind books and rebuilt computers so he couldn’t hear the teasing.

He’d outgrown the skinny phase, graduated valedictorian and had his pick of colleges. He and his mother, Moira, had worked for years to rebuild the estate that had been decimated by his father’s debt, so he had a little money to his name. He’d become a cop after earning the first of two degrees, and had made detective on his first application. He’d made his share of mistakes along the way, but he’d solved crimes. He’d taken bullets and killed men in the line of duty.

Thomas Merle Banning, Jr. wasn’t anybody’s victim anymore.

But he’d never forget what it felt like.

And he’d never fail to recognize it in someone else.

Kelsey Ryan had been hurt somewhere along the way in her life. Now she dyed her hair and lost her temper and put on airs because she didn’t want anyone to see how much she hurt.

Merle nudged the beat-up shoe box sitting on the corner of his desk. He might not believe her story about the doll triggering visions of murder. But he should have believed her intentions. A woman like that wouldn’t knowingly set herself up to be ridiculed. She wouldn’t take that risk unless she believed what she was saying.

It wasn’t all that long ago that he’d worked his tail off to get someone to listen to his ideas, to take him seriously. To give him a chance to prove his worth to the world.

Mitch Taylor had given him that chance.

He’d be a hypocrite if he didn’t offer Kelsey Ryan that same chance.

Merle pulled the box closer and read the name of the defunct local shoe company imprinted in faded green letters on the box. Clearly, the doll wasn’t in its original packaging. Flipping over the lid of the box, Merle poked at the multicolored afghan wrapped around the doll inside and wondered who had knitted it. Probably Kelsey herself, judging by the rainbow palette of colors. He pulled out the bundle and unwrapped it on his desk.

He had to believe she really thought there was some kind of answer here.

Merle peeled back a layer of worn newsprint, taking a moment to check the faded date. December 24, 1994.

“The day before Christmas.”

He frowned as the encyclopedia of random facts he carried around inside his head tried to tell him something. Slipping on his wire-frame glasses, he scrolled through the data on the computer screen until he found the first victim in the file—a Jane Doe prostitute the original investigators had dubbed Jezebel.

He scanned the information, then rechecked the wadded paper around the doll. He checked the computer again. “Gotta be a coincidence.”

Jezebel’s strangled, nude body had been discovered in an alley the day after Christmas.

1994.

Merle sat straighter in his chair, pulled a pair of plastic gloves from the bottom drawer and put them on.

Most coincidences could be explained away by facts.

Beneath the old newsprint he found a layer of tissue paper wrapped around the doll. The doll itself looked like some sort of collectible, with a face and body crafted of wire and silk and stuffing. It had feathery golden hair and wore an embroidered gown trimmed in beads of glass and mother-of-pearl. Pretty nice handiwork.

Pretty nice gift for someone back in 1994.

Probably given to someone the very same day Jezebel was murdered. His brain hovered around the information, absorbing what he read on the screen and saw in the box, trying to make a plausible connection.

“Taking up a new hobby?”

Merle glanced up at the deep, laughter-filled voice, and watched the Odd Couple of the Fourth Precinct—Josh Taylor and A. J. Rodriguez—stroll past to the pair of desks beside his.

“Right. I’m into playing with dolls now.” Pulling off his glasses, Merle shook his head. “I’m trying to figure out if this is evidence or just a bad joke.”

Josh—a big, blond goofball who was always into everybody’s business—dumped his coat in his chair and propped his hip on the corner of his desk. “I heard you got the honor of dealing with The Flake this morning. Does that have anything to do with her?”

“She brought it in. Said she had a vision—” he held up his hand and corrected himself the way she’d corrected him “—excuse me, a psychic impression, of one of the Holiday Hooker murders. She said this doll was the key to interpreting that impression.”

“Cool.” Josh, Captain Taylor’s youngest cousin, was nothing if not direct. “You buy what she said?”

“Claiming she was inside the victim’s skin, feeling her pain and terror as she was being murdered? No.” He smoothed the newsprint between his plastic-gloved fingers. “But the date on this packaging matches the time frame of the first death. It’s as good as anything else I have to go on. Which isn’t much.”

“Might be worth checking out.” A. J. never said much. But then, the dark-haired, compactly built detective didn’t have to. Merle had quickly learned that with his instincts and street smarts, and an eerie patience that allowed him to sit back and let the other guy show his hand first, A. J. didn’t need to waste time with idle words. He waited until he had something to say. And then smart people listened.

If he thought this was a lead worth pursuing…

Merle had already made his decision. But it was nice to know he had some backup on his opinion. “If you gents will excuse me?”

He flipped through the pages of his notebook, reluctantly accepting that his dealings with Kelsey Ryan hadn’t ended. Locating the cell number she’d given him, he punched it in. As he waited through several rings, he worked to adjust his attitude. This wasn’t just another crazy trip into la-la land; it was an opportunity to make amends and ease his conscience. An opportunity to do the job Captain Taylor expected of him. Maybe he could find a few answers along the way, as well.

“Hello?” The soft, almost timid voice at the other end of the line surprised him. But Merle recognized the subtle hint of a southern Missouri twang from their lunchtime conversation.

“Ms. Ryan? This is Detective Banning at the Fourth Precinct.”

He could hear her bristling up, donning that huffy, self-protective shield she wore. He could also hear the honks and hums of traffic moving in the background. “Detective.”

So much for conversational pleasantries. He didn’t suppose he’d earned any friendly overtures, so he kept his tone as businesslike and impersonal as hers. “I was calling to ask for the name of the shop where you bought the doll. Looks like there might be some loose ends I can follow up on, after all.”

“Too late, Banning. I’m a step ahead of you. I already talked to Mr. Meisner at the Westport Antique Mall where I bought it, and he said he purchased the doll from The Underground. That’s a pawnshop over on 10th Street off of Broadway. I’m on my way there right now to find out where they got it.”

“You what?” Every muscle in Merle’s body clenched.

Broadway and 10th was smack in the middle of no-man’s land, nestled between the new construction around the Bartle Convention Center and the reclamation of downtown. Merle checked his watch and wished he could look out a window. By four-thirty this late in December, the sun would already be fading. Legitimate businesses would be closing soon and, despite the winter chill, less legitimate entrepreneurs would be crawling out of their cubbyholes to open shop. The people who actually lived in the neighborhood didn’t always welcome strangers, especially ones who asked a lot of questions. And he had a feeling she wouldn’t be shy about asking.

Merle was already buttoning his collar and rolling down his sleeves. “You cannot go into that neighborhood by yourself. Especially after dark.”

“It’s okay, Detective Banning. The danger’s all in my imagination. Remember?”

Click.

She hung up on him?

He was trying to protect her butt and she hung up on him?

Merle shot to his feet. Unfamiliar frissons of anger mixed with a chilling pulse beat of concern. He grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair and shoved things into his pockets.

“Problem?” asked Josh, looking up from his desk. He had A. J.’s attention, too.

“Yeah.” His problem was about five and a half feet of mouthy redhead who thought she could goad him into working with her. “This temporary partner thing isn’t working out.”

“You’ve got a new partner?”

“I’ve got a departmental consultant who doesn’t know when to quit.” He jerked the knot of his tie up to his collar. “If I don’t show up for work tomorrow, tell the captain I gave my all for a little good press.”

Josh and A. J. laughed as he shrugged into his coat and dashed to the elevators. Kelsey Ryan might know the how-to’s on following up leads, but she didn’t know squat about surviving out on the streets.

He intended to get her home, safe and sound, and then get her out of his hair.

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