At Close Range

And from there, maybe the killer.

“Want to keep going?” Varitek asked.

She rocked back on her heels and surveyed the scene. “Well, we’ve gone down to the original excavation and past it by about six inches. We’re in undisturbed ground for the most part, so we probably won’t find anything else. That being the case, let’s go down another two inches just to be sure.”

He nodded. “Works for me.” He glanced at the sky, which was clear and bright with spring. “The weather’s on our side, and putting a name to this skeleton would be a huge break.” He dug in. “Besides, the next task force meeting isn’t until this evening.”

The chief had timed their meetings for the overlap when the day shift went off and the night shift was just coming on. It sounded good in theory, but in practice the task force cops worked pretty much round the clock and reported in when they had something.

Knowing it, Cassie kept one ear out for the ring of her cell as she and Varitek skimmed off another layer of wet grit.

The first call was from the ME, Boniface, who reported that the young man had died of strangulation, as the ligature marks had suggested, and that the finger wound had likely been caused by a smooth bladed knife. He couldn’t explain the cautery of the wound, but theorized that the knife could have been heated.

Cassie made a mental note to check the wound scrapings for carbonization that might support the hypothesis.

Other reports filtered in as the afternoon grew long and the grave widened. Mendoza and Piedmont reported that the apartment where the body was dumped had been rented six months earlier in the name of Randy Meyers, but things got complicated after that. Meyers, a midlevel extreme skier, had been tracked down in Tahoe. He claimed to have handed the apartment over to a female friend when he’d grown bored of the Bear Claw slopes. She, in turn, had sublet to some guy, first name Nevada, last name unknown.

They would identify the body eventually, but it would take time.

After that report, there was a lull in the phone traffic and the silence hung heavy. Finally, almost unwillingly, Varitek said, “You mentioned that your mother died when you were young. That must have been tough.”

Cassie wasn’t sure which surprised her most, that he’d made a personal comment, or that he remembered her passing mention. Then again, they were up to their elbows in a grave. Death seemed like a reasonable topic.

“My father raised me from five on,” she answered, “and my four older brothers pitched in. They nearly smothered me with their good intentions, but I love them dearly.” She paused, then added, “From a distance.”

Varitek smiled slightly. The expression softened his face just enough to take it from fierce to unexpectedly sexy. “I have an older sister,” he said. “CeeCee was overprotective as hell when we were kids. I can’t begin to imagine what four brothers must’ve been like.”

“A little like you times four,” she said without thinking, disarmed by the fact that they were actually having a pleasant conversation, “only they don’t have the tall, dark and handsome thing going for them.”

Then she froze. Oh, God. Please tell me I didn’t just say that aloud.

But his sudden, complete stillness told her that she had, indeed.

She climbed to her feet, stripped off her gloves and faced him. Blood tingled in her cheeks. “Sorry. That was uncalled for, especially after I lectured you about treating me like a cop. Let’s forget I said that. Let’s forget I even thought it.”

But when Varitek stood and faced her, his expression was intent and wholly focused on her. “You want to know why I reached the crime scene before you yesterday? Because I was already in town. I’d driven down here for no real reason except to drop in on you and see…” He twisted his lips with more self-deprecation than humor. “Hell, I don’t know why. Because I couldn’t get you out of my head, I suppose.”

Blood skimmed through her body, just below her skin, warming her, worrying her. She blew out a breath and said, “Look, Varitek—”

“You should probably call me Seth at this point, don’t you think?”

“Look,” she said, and skipped the name entirely, “this is a really, really bad idea. We can barely hold a civil conversation, and I’m not in the market for a…whatever.” She’d been uncomfortable talking about her emotions ever since her relationship with Lee, who had been a master of taking those emotions and turning them back on her until she wasn’t sure where her opinion left off and his began. Besides, she wasn’t about to name the things that flitted through her mind, like…lover. Boyfriend. Husband. Soul mate.

“I’m not in the market for a whatever, either.” A dark, introspective smile touched his lips. “I think maybe that’s why I came down. So I could remind myself that we’d be wrong together.”

“We’d be terrible,” she said, as much to herself as to him. “I’m cranky and territorial. You’re controlling and overprotective. Hell, we don’t even work well together.” Although they had excavated the grave shoulder-to-shoulder and it hadn’t been as awful as she’d feared. Indeed, it had been almost…solid. Good. She felt the hard bump of the class ring folded in its plastic envelope and knew they’d made progress.

But she’d let physical attraction override common sense once before and it had been a disaster. Hell, it’d nearly ruined her career. No way she was letting that happen again.

She was older and smarter now.

Wasn’t she?

HOURS LATER, after they’d attended the task force meeting and logged in the evidence from the old grave site, Cassie finally signed out and headed home. With her truck impounded as evidence—wasn’t that ironic?—she had no wheels, so she didn’t even bother with a token protest when Varitek offered to drive her home.

She bristled when he walked her to the door.

Key in hand, she faced him on the front porch. “I’m not asking you in.”

The corners of his mouth twitched. “I didn’t expect you to. I’ll stay out here while you check the house.”

“Go.” She waved him off with a shooing motion, too tired to deal with him. “I’ll be fine.” When he didn’t budge, she said, “Come on, give me a break here. I’m tired, I’m hungry, and I’m armed. Just go. I’ll see you in the morning.”

After a momentary stand off, Varitek scowled. “Fine. See you tomorrow.” He stalked away, leaving her feeling like she’d been childish and surly.

Which she had been.

“Oh, fine,” she muttered under her breath, stabbing her key into the lock. “I’ll apologize to him tomorrow.” She twisted the knob and pushed through the front door as Varitek’s truck pulled away.

Two steps inside her door, someone grabbed her. She screamed and tried to spin, but he yanked her arm up behind her back. The sharp pain of a needle flared in her shoulder, followed by cool, burning numbness.

Then nothing.

SETH MADE IT ALL THE WAY to his hotel before he turned back. He told himself not to bother, that they could talk it out in the morning when one—or both of them—was in a better frame of mind. But something compelled him to spin the truck around and head back to her yellow house on the outskirts of town.

When he got there, he saw that the other half of the side-by-side two-family was lit. A shadow skimmed past a curtained window as he watched. The neighbors were still up. In contrast, all of the lights on Cassie’s side of the house were off—not just the outside light that had been burning when he’d left, but the room lights, as well. It was as though she’d never come home.

She’s asleep, he told himself, though it wasn’t much past eight o’clock. She skipped dinner and headed straight to bed.

Then he saw the barest hint of motion at the corner of the house, near Cassie’s side window. It could’ve been a small animal in search of scraps.

It could’ve been an intruder.

Seth slapped the truck into Park, radioed an alert to the Bear Claw dispatcher, grabbed his flashlight and service revolver and hastened across the muddy lawn. He didn’t even think about chasing the shadow. He needed to get to Cassie first, needed to know she was okay.

And if that meant he was ruled by his past, then so be it.

He crossed the porch in three echoing strides and pounded on the door. “Cassie? Cassie, open up or I’m coming through.”

He paused, counted to five, and when there wasn’t a hint of sound or motion from inside, he stepped back two paces and turned his shoulder toward the door.

But before he could launch himself, the porch light snapped on, the neighboring door opened and a long shotgun barrel poked through. “Hold it right there,” a man’s voice said. “Drop the weapon and don’t move. I’m calling the police.”

Seth froze in his tracks and hissed a curse between his teeth. “I’ve already called them. I’m an FBI agent and I believe Officer Dumont is in trouble.”

“Sorry, but I’m not letting you bust into Cassie’s place without a look at your badge, mister.” The door opened fully, revealing that the shotgun owner was young, probably early twenties and baby-faced with it. But he held his pump action with the ease of familiarity, and an infant’s fretful cry emerged from inside, followed by a woman’s soothing tones.

Seth could have the guy down in two seconds flat, but a new father with a gun? He didn’t want to go there. So he said, “I’m going to go for my ID, real easy, okay? I don’t want any trouble.”