Silent Night Stakeout

She showered and dressed as quickly as possible, already deciding to stop for coffee on the way rather than take the time to make it. Within fifteen minutes she was ready to go. Making her way downstairs, she tugged on her coat and, ignoring the packed suitcases lined up by it, pulled the door open.

She was about to step outside, her gaze lowering as she fumbled through her keys, when she saw it.

There was something on her front porch.

She froze, her keys forgotten. The snow hadn’t reached the porch, so the object, stark white against the brown of the wood, was plainly visible—and immediately noticeable as out of place. She stared at it for a moment, unsure what to do. Peering closer, she tried to identify it. It was white. Some kind of paper? No, the texture was wrong. It looked like some kind of fabric. Almost like—

A handkerchief.

Dread held her in place for a moment, her mind automatically going back to the last handkerchief she’d seen, the one shoved in Jeremy Decker’s gaping mouth. The one she’d thought was red.

The handkerchief most likely didn’t start out red.

No, in order to end up that color of red, it must have started out white. As white as the handkerchief sitting on her front porch.

And it was just sitting there, slightly crumpled or folded over. It didn’t move other than the edges fluttering the slightest bit. A cold wind was blowing outside. She could feel it swirling around her ankles. Yet the handkerchief didn’t blow away. Something must be holding it in place.

And in a horrifying instant, she knew what it was.

Her mind immediately rebelled, her stomach nearly doing the same. The idea was too terrible to consider. She desperately tried to think of another explanation, and came up blank.

Still, she had to know.

Digging into her bag for a pen, she inched closer to the handkerchief. Coming only as near as necessary, she leaned in, using the pen to ease back the corner of the fabric where it was folded over.

One glance was all it took to see her instincts had been correct.

Expecting it didn’t protect her from the shock of seeing it herself. She reeled back, already wishing she hadn’t looked, already trying to block out the image.

If the killer was sending a message, that message was most likely intended for you.

Detective Waters’s words echoed faintly from the back of her mind.

Waters.

She should call him. She should call somebody. It only made sense that it should be him. Even as the thought occurred to her, she was reaching into her pocket for the business card he’d given her, then for her cell phone.

She forced herself to focus on the tiny digits on the card and dialed the number with trembling fingers.

It took only two rings for him to answer.

“Waters.”

The sound of that voice sent a rush of relief through her, the emotion fiercer than she had any business feeling.

“Detective Waters, this is Regina Garrett.”

There was the briefest of pauses before he responded. “Of course, Ms. Garrett. What can I do for you?”

“I’m at home. There was something on my front porch when I opened my door this morning.”

“What kind of something?”

“A white handkerchief. And there’s something in it. I think—” She swallowed hard, tried to force the words out when her throat just wanted to gag.

“I think I found Jeremy Decker’s tongue.”

Chapter Four

If there had been any question whether the removal of Jeremy Decker’s tongue was supposed to be a message, Marcus figured its arrival on Regina Garrett’s porch provided a pretty definitive answer. From the look on her face, she knew it as well as he did.

It was a message, all right—a message that now had literally been delivered to her.

Not that he spent much time looking at her face. He deliberately avoided it, keeping his eyes on his notebook as he took her statement about what had happened.

Unfortunately, for more reasons than one, there wasn’t much she could tell him and he soon ran out of questions. “I guess that does it,” he concluded, finally looking up with some reluctance. “Unless there’s anything else you can think of that might be helpful?”

“There isn’t,” she said firmly. “I didn’t see or hear anything.”

He wasn’t surprised. The tongue hadn’t been there when she’d arrived home, so it must have been delivered in the middle of the night while she was sleeping. Polinsky was checking with the neighbors to see if anyone had seen the person who’d left it. Marcus doubted anyone had. Even if one of her neighbors had been awake at that hour, he suspected the perpetrator would have done everything to make it impossible for anybody to identify him or her. It shouldn’t have been a difficult task, given the weather and the kind of bulky winter clothing most people were wearing these days. This person seemed determined to prevent Regina from revealing something. After going to this much trouble, they weren’t going to risk having their identity revealed by getting caught leaving the tongue on her porch.

He also didn’t doubt the tongue had been left by the person who’d cut it out of Jeremy Decker’s mouth in the first place. It wasn’t exactly a gift someone could ask a second party to deliver. It was too personal. Everything about this was too personal.

Marcus didn’t tell Regina Garrett any of that. She looked unsettled enough—rather understandably, he thought as he studied her. They stood in her living room—she’d declined the opportunity to sit—as the crime scene techs photographed what she’d found on her porch and collected it for evidence. Her expression was calm, but her posture gave her away. She was ramrod straight, her spine stiff, her arms folded over her chest. One hand stroked up and down the opposite forearm absently as though she was subconsciously trying to comfort herself. His gaze lingered on the motion, and he felt something clutch in his chest.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked before he could stop himself.

“I’m fine,” she said with a tight smile, then sighed gently. “At least as fine as I can be. I’m past the initial shock of finding…it at any rate.”

He nodded, not sure if he should believe her.

As though confirming his doubts about her emotional state, she cleared her throat softly and asked, “Is it all right if I use the bathroom?”

“Of course.”

With a tight nod she turned and started out of the room. When Marcus realized he was watching her walk away, he immediately lowered his eyes and slowly exhaled, releasing the air that had been pent up in his lungs.

He’d spent the past twelve hours trying not to think about Regina Garrett. Her open, lovely face. Her soft, inviting scent that had stayed in his vehicle long after they’d parted ways. It should have been easy. God knew he had plenty of other things to think about, a million other subjects fighting for his attention. But somehow his thoughts had kept being pulled back to her. Even after he’d gone to bed, he’d lain awake for far too long, and what he’d thought about was her.

Then, just when he’d finally settled in at work that morning and found the means to push her out of his mind, she’d called with the news of her discovery. And so here he was, in the home of a woman he couldn’t seem to get out of his head. A woman who, despite the shock of what she’d found, looked even better than he’d remembered.

He gave his head a brief shake. He didn’t know what it was about her that had grabbed his attention so firmly and refused to let go. Yes, she was beautiful, but he’d met beautiful women before. Maybe not as beautiful, maybe not in the same way, but beautiful nonetheless. Yet there was something different about this woman. From the very first moment he’d seen her, he’d responded to her in a way he never had to any woman before and couldn’t seem to shake. But whatever the reason, this wasn’t the time and these really weren’t the circumstances for him to be thinking about her like that. He was pretty sure he had no business thinking about this particular woman at all.

Seeking a distraction, Marcus scanned the interior of her home, trying to get a sense of the woman who lived here—strictly for the case. It was a two-story, single-family house, and she’d already told him she lived alone. It wasn’t the kind of place he would have pictured her living, but the woman seemed to be full of surprises, and now that he was here, he had to admit it seemed to fit her.

She appeared to be neat, but not fanatically so. There were enough signs that the room was lived in—a few magazines tossed on the coffee table, an afghan loosely folded at the end of the couch—without too much unnecessary clutter. There were no Christmas decorations on display. She had no tree, no wreath on the door. Even in the light of day, he’d noticed that hers appeared to be the only house on the block without any lights or displays outside. It was something they had in common, he acknowledged before he could think better of it. He hadn’t bothered with any decorations at his place, either.

Not comfortable with the comparison, Marcus glanced toward the front door, hearing the sounds of Polinsky talking to the techs outside. He noticed, not for the first time, that there were two matching suitcases lined up neatly in the entryway, as though ready and waiting to be carried out.