Chapter 19

19

Officer Ellis showed her pictures, first of the woman before she had been attacked.

Madison studied them and sighed. The woman, Allison, had been pretty. Not gorgeous or striking, but she looked like a very nice person. She had one of those smiles that made people feel at ease.

But Madison wasn’t sure if she had been the woman.

“She could have been the woman, but I’m not sure.” She handed the picture back to Ellis. “Did they find any clothes? I might be able to recognize them.”

He shook his head. “She was found nude. No ID on her.”

“And you said she was the victim of a stalker?”

He nodded. “The guy has an alibi though. He was in the hospital that night.”

“Convenient,” Dante murmured. He was sitting beside her on the couch. Every now and then she would feel his hand brush over her back.

“Not so much. He ate some very bad oysters in San Diego. He spent the night getting his stomach pumped.”

“So, where does this leave us?”

He blew out a breath. “I’m not sure. I am going to go back over my notes. Now, tell me what happened here tonight?”

She told him everything, citing everything she did that day and what she found when she got home.

“And you’ve done this before?”

“Yes.”

“But she didn’t this time,” Dante said.

The officer looked between them, then down at Dante’s hand on her knee. “I know you don’t want to think it.”

“No. Just like every freaking drama on TV, you have a preconceived notion about people with PTSD.”

She could tell that Dante’s comment irritated the officer. “I served in the Marines, so back off on the subject.”

Dante shrugged. “The truth is, in the past, she always had huge blocks of time missing. Or she would wake up with her house that way. This time she can account for every minute of her day.”

“How about when you got home?”

“I talked to my neighbor.”

“Who told me I arrived less than ten minutes after she did. These things would have taken longer than ten minutes. Someone was in here. Someone who knows about her condition. Did you include it in your report?”

The officer made a face. “I had to.”

“Great.”

“Those are confidential.”

Dante snorted. “That’s what they say about our credit card info and NSA records, but both of them have been hacked in some way. Nothing is completely confidential. Especially if her name was associated with it. And what if it were a cop?”

Oh, Ellis didn’t like that accusation one bit, but he was smart enough to fight his reaction. He took a few seconds to calm his temper, but he couldn’t hide the anger in his eyes. Madison was pretty sure he would have told Dante to fuck off if he could.

“Okay, we are getting off track. I want you to think back about your day and if anything seemed odd, out of place, or strange, let me know. Maybe we can figure something out.”

She nodded and rose as he did. “Thank you.”

They saw him to the door. Dante closed it behind the officer. He was still frowning. He stared at her for a few moments before he spoke.

“Do you always have to put up with that?”

“What?”

“People treating you as if you’re about to go off on them because of your PTSD?”

Dante was always blunt, but it was one of the things she liked about him. Charlie walked up and sat beside her. She smoothed a palm over his head.

“Sometimes.”

“Oh, freaking irritating.” He came to her and pulled her into his arms. “How about we eat a little something, then I let you convince me we should conserve water and take a shower together?”

And like that, some of her irritation and fear faded away. “Conserve water, huh?”

He nodded. “Just being responsible.”

Then he kissed her nose and headed into the kitchen. She watched him and decided right there and then, any woman who was lucky enough to spend time with a Santini was definitely blessed.

A loud crash on his bed woke Zach the next morning. “Fucking hell.”

“Nice language, Ellis,” a sultry, southern voice said.

Not his bed, he realized. He was still at work. He opened his eyes and found Sarah Wilson smiling at him. She was holding up his stapler, ready to drop it on his desk.

“Lord, you sleep like the dead,” she said, setting his stapler down.

He rose up from his desk and stretched his arms above his head. He ran his tongue between his lip and his teeth. It felt like he had cotton stuffed up there.

“I hear you’re working the Baker case.”

He looked at her and she shrugged. “Captain wasn’t supposed to tell me, but I am his niece. I worked the original case.”

“Yeah,” he said absentmindedly. He searched his desk for his phone. He saw it was just after five in the morning. He needed a shower. No, he thought, he needed a toothbrush and then a shower.

“Hey.”

He looked up. “What?”

“I came in early when you didn’t answer my phone calls last night.”

“Phone calls?” He checked his phone and saw three missed calls. “Sorry.”

She waved it away. “I didn’t want to talk about this in mixed company because I rub people the wrong way when I talk about things, but I thought I would give you a little background.”

“I read the case files. It wasn’t really your case.”

“Nope, but I was the female officer on record for her. I was the one who found her therapist.”

Something niggled at the back of his mind. “Therapist?”

“Yes. She wanted to just go hide, but I got her in with Dr. James. He is highly sought after and usually works with the military only, but he is very good at helping with PTSD. And believe me, she had it.”

He barely heard what she said. There was something that was trying to jiggle loose from his memory and he realized it was the name. “Where do I know that name from?”

She shrugged. “Did you get help when you got back?”

He finally focused on her and realized she knew him, or at least his history.

“No. I didn’t have PTSD.”

“Ah. Well, he worked with her. He was really good.”

Ellis grabbed his notes, his mind working through what Ms. Baker had told him the night before. Then he saw the name. The connection of why someone would know who she was and how the intruder had known her idiosyncrasies.

“Fuck.”

Irritation that he hadn’t caught it before and fear for Madison Baker twisted in his chest. He stood, grabbed his jacket and his gun.

“What?”

He didn’t say anything as he called first Ms. Baker’s number then Captain Santini’s. Nothing. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck .

Zach was running to the door when she shouted, “Where are you going?”

He gave the address. “Send some units there.”

He didn’t have any proof, he thought as he ran down the hallway to his car, but his gut was churning. Something told him Baker and Santini were in danger.