SEVEN
“What are you doing here so early, Junior?”
Cora glanced up to find Detective Andre Medina standing in the doorway of the computer room with a smile. She hated when people called her Junior, but somehow Medina pulled it off. Probably because he was so damn charming. He could tell you that you were under arrest and you’d happily hold out your wrists for his cuffs.
His hands were tucked in his pockets and his tie was loosened like he’d had a long night. He and his partner were working a horrid double-murder case, and the two of them were under all kinds of pressure from her mother and the media to get it solved quickly.
Cora pointed at the laptop in front of her. “I offered to dig through the Candor case since no one else was having any luck. I have another job to go to at eight, so I thought I’d sneak this in before then.”
Andre frowned. “Is that the case with that teacher from the middle school?”
She leaned back in her chair and grimaced. “Yeah. Good news is I found some damning stuff. Bad news . . .”
“Is that the allegations are true.”
She blew out a breath, already drained even though her day had barely started. This was the hardest part of working at the station. She loved unraveling a mystery and liked that she could help, but she hated some of the stuff she had to see. The dark side of human nature was an ugly place. A teacher posing as a teen on Facebook and coaxing naked photos from his students was pretty fucking ugly. “Exactly.”
Andre stepped inside and braced his hands on the back of the chair in front of her desk, looking more tired than she’d ever seen him. “Well, I hope the job you’re going to next is less grim than this.”
“The jury’s still out on that.”
“Another precinct?”
“No, it’s at FoxRen Media. They have a pretty heinous hacker to deal with, though.”
Andre’s eyebrows went up. “FoxRen? I know those guys, the owners. Jace and my brother-in-law are investors in the company.”
“Oh.” Fuck. What was wrong with her? She should’ve never mentioned the name or that they had a problem. Andre’s husband had invested in them? Great. Confidentiality fail. “Well, I’m sure I’ll get their systems fixed in no time. Nothing to worry about long-term. Please don’t say anything to anyone. I shouldn’t have said—”
He held up a hand. “It’s fine. Jace knows those guys well enough to trust them to tell him if something is seriously wrong. But . . .”
He glanced back toward the open door.
Cora frowned. “But what?”
Andre turned back to her, a crease in his brow. “Have you met Muroya and Fox yet?”
She sat up straighter, not liking the sudden wary tone. “Yes. Ren is the one who hired me and I briefly met Hayes.”
“And what’d you think of them?”
Hot. Intimidating. “Ren seems like a handful but friendly. Sharp. Hayes seemed . . . quiet.”
“Yeah. That’s a good assessment.” Andre stepped around the chair and sat, leaning forward and lowering his voice. “But do you know anything about them? The history?”
“I—” She pressed her lips together. “Not really. I mean, I know the company’s been around for a few years, but I just got hired. I haven’t had time to do any research.”
Andre rubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw, looking like he was debating on telling her whatever it was.
“What is it, Medina? You’re freaking me out.”
Andre grimaced. “All right. Listen, Junior. I like your mom and respect the hell out of her, but I know she’s crazy protective over you and can be a little over the top with that. You should’ve heard the talk she gave all the guys and girls before you started helping out here. So you’re going to have to trust me when I tell you not to let your mom know that you’re working at FoxRen.”
Cora’s brow scrunched. “What? Why?”
“Let’s just say she wouldn’t willingly let you within fifty feet of Hayes Fox.”
Her stomach clenched. “What’s wrong with Hayes?”
The lines around Andre’s mouth deepened as he peered back at the door again and then looked at her. “Fox just got out of prison a few months ago.”
“What?”
“Yeah. The original case went through here. It was before I got to this precinct, but your mom oversaw the investigation.”
Her mind was reeling, remembering the intensity of Hayes, the way he’d looked at her, the way her body had responded. The edge of danger that had tripped her alarm bells. She swallowed past the dryness in her throat. “What was he in for? White-collar crime or something?”
Andre’s jaw flexed. “Aggravated rape.”
Her stomach plummeted and her skin went cold. “Shit.”
“I know. But listen. I know the guy, knew him before he went in, and he didn’t do what they said he did. He wouldn’t have. The conviction was overturned. That’s why he’s out.”
But she could barely hear him. “Rape.”
“Hey,” Andre said, trying to catch her eye. “Listen to me. You know I wouldn’t give you the thumbs-up to go work for the guy if I thought there was even a glimmer of a chance he was guilty. But I promise you, your mother will absolutely not feel the same way. She helped put him behind bars. When he got out, she went on a rant about how he bought his way out of his conviction. So she will flip her shit if she knows you’re anywhere near him.”
Cora lifted up her glasses and rubbed the spot between her eyes, a headache hatching. “How do you know, Medina? What if he’s a good liar? You see it all the time with sociopaths. They can trick their best friend, their wife, you name it. I don’t want to be working with a rapist. No money is worth that.”
Andre sat back in his chair. “It’s absolutely your call. I’m just telling you that I one hundred percent know that he didn’t do what he was accused of. That’s all I can give you. The rest is his personal business.”
She opened her eyes and put her glasses back in place, the news pressing down on her like sacks of grain. On one hand, she trusted Andre’s word. The guy wouldn’t tell her this unless he really believed it. He was as protective of women as they come. But she’d also grown up with a cop mother. People could be world-class liars. People who you’d never ever suspect were bad could do horrible things. The only people who could truly know if Hayes was guilty were Hayes and the woman he’d been with. And Andre wasn’t one of those two. But innocent people had also gone to jail for crimes they didn’t commit.
She felt sick to her stomach. She’d spent so much of her life avoiding danger, being on the lookout, learning how to be safe. That part of her said to bail, to not take the risk. Better safe than dead. That was the motto her mother had taught her. She could find another job. But at the same time, she was so damn tired of being on guard all the time, of looking for malicious intent whether she had reason to or not. She’d done everything she was supposed to and still somehow got attacked on her porch. Safety was never a one hundred percent guarantee no matter what you did. She wanted to be smart, but she didn’t want to live a paranoid life. Hayes had made her nervous, but he hadn’t scared her. She’d been drawn to him, not repelled.
If she was supposed to trust her gut, her gut wasn’t saying run.
She didn’t want to run.
But she would have to be on full alert. She wasn’t going to walk away from this job based on unproven information. She could handle herself and would make sure she was always in a safe situation—co-workers around, not working late, not being alone with him. And if Hayes showed any bad sign or made her uncomfortable in any way, she was out of there. But for now, she was going to trust her gut and Andre’s word.
“Thanks for letting me know,” she said finally. “There’s no need to tell my mother anything at this point anyway. It’s just a job.”
Andre nodded and rubbed a hand over the back of his dark hair. “Okay, well, I’m going to get my paperwork out of the way and then go home. I think I forgot to sleep yesterday.”
She shook her head. “You should ask one of the officers to drive you home.”
He stood and stretched. “Nah. I have a toddler who thinks two A.M is an awesome time for chats. I’m used to existing on no sleep. But if I hit the point of no return, I’ll call Evan or Jace to come pick me up. That’s why I married them both. I always have a designated driver.”
Cora smiled. “Good thinking.”
“Right? I’m a genius.” Andre gave her a mock salute and headed out. “Later, Junior.”
“See ya.” Cora watched him go, shaking her head.
Andre had a unique relationship—a husband and a wife—and all three parented their little girl, Lucy. When Andre had “come out” with that information at work, it had caused quite the gossip wave. How does that work? Does that mean Medina’s sleeping with the guy, too? Whose kid is it? Everyone seemed to have a question or an opinion on the matter. That will never last. You don’t get to have cake and eat it, too. That child is going to be so confused. But Cora had kept her thoughts to herself, all the while thinking, He gets two people who love him so much they want to be with him forever. How amazing must that feel?
Cora rolled her neck and resisted Googling Hayes on her phone. It was probably best she didn’t know details right now. She just needed to get to FoxRen today, lock herself in an office, and tear apart their system until she found what she needed to take down the motherfucker who’d gotten her attacked.
Cora spun in her chair and closed the laptop she’d been working on. She didn’t notice she wasn’t alone anymore until the faint scent of her mother’s perfume hit her. Her mother had worn the same scent since Cora was a kid. Just because I’m a cop doesn’t mean I can’t smell good. The jasmine-and-vanilla combo was comforting to Cora in a lot of ways. When she was young, it meant her mom was home from work and safe. Janet Benning had won for another night. But right now, Cora assumed it wasn’t a harbinger of good news.
“So when were you going to tell me?” The words hit her in the back like tiny, sharp needles.
Cora closed her eyes, took a breath, and swiveled her chair around. “Hi, Mom.”
Her mom wasn’t in uniform today, but managed to look official anyway in her simple white blouse and pressed gray pants, her badge on her hip. Her dark bottle-red hair was pulled back into a stylish knot. She only had a touch of makeup on but somehow looked at least ten years younger than her fifty-two years. Effortlessly pretty as always. The frown lines on her face gave some of that effect away, though. “Coraline.”
She groaned. No matter what, her mom always made her feel twelve years old again. “It wasn’t a big deal. The guy ran off. I didn’t get hurt.”
“Do you know what it does to me to hear something like this from one of my officers instead of my own daughter? This happened last Thursday and you didn’t bother to tell me? You could’ve been hurt or raped or worse. What were you doing out that late? And why didn’t you have your Taser ready?”
“So we’re blaming the victim now?”
“Don’t pull that BS with me. You know that’s not what I’m saying.” The words were biting, but her brown eyes were swamped with worry.
That took the wind out of Cora’s sails. “Look, I’m sorry. I went to a business mixer with Grace. It was outside of the city and wasn’t over until late. I was tired and got careless. I wasn’t paying attention like I should’ve been. Believe me, it won’t happen again. And I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to worry.”
Janet sank into the chair across from her and shook her head. “I told you that neighborhood wasn’t the best. You can’t plunk a hip coffee shop and an organic burger joint in the middle of a notoriously high-crime neighborhood and magically make it more safe.”
“It’s a transitional neighborhood. And it’s not that bad. My neighbors are nice and look out for each other. And the hookers and drug pushers are at least four blocks away.”
Her mom pinched the bridge of her nose, a sign she was hitting her smartass tolerance for the morning. “I don’t know why you don’t just move back home with me and Greg until you can afford something better. You know we don’t need that whole house to ourselves and we’re barely there anyway.”
Cora pressed her lips together to keep the Oh, hell no from slipping out. This was an old argument. She loved her mother more than anyone else on this planet. And Greg, her mom’s boyfriend of the last six years, was great. But Cora had done her time at home. She’d already lived that legacy. Being exposed to what her mom had would’ve made anyone paranoid and overprotective. Cora understood, but she wouldn’t enter that brand of captivity again no matter how well-intentioned. “I’m twenty-six, Mom. I have a life plan to not become a cliché. And living in my mother’s basement is the biggest of them all. I’m good.”
“We don’t have a basement.”
“It’s proverbial.”
Her mother huffed a breath, her impatience obvious. “I’m worried about you, honey. Did you get a good look at the guy? Was it anyone you’ve seen before?”
“I’ve never seen him before.”
“Are you sure? Could it be someone you investigated here? I hold your name out of things but it keeps me up at night wondering what might happen if someone finds out you’re helping put them behind bars. Maybe it’s time that you stop—”
Cora put up her hand, cutting her off. “I got a good look. He was a stranger. College-aged. I’d recognize him if it was a case I’d worked on. What I do here has nothing to do with what happened.”
As much as her mom appreciated Cora’s help on cases, she’d always been reluctant to let Cora continue with it. It’d started with an internship years ago—which was really a way for her mother to keep a close eye on her while she’d been in college. It was supposed to be temporary. But Cora hadn’t wanted to walk away once she’d graduated. Where else could she work and feel like she was really making an impact? Where there were clear results? So she’d applied for a more permanent position that would have let her provide services to multiple precincts. Her application had been denied. Her mom had blamed it on the city not wanting nepotism, but Cora had known who’d made sure it didn’t happen.
Janet pressed her lips together. “Do you think he’ll come back?”
“No. He thought I was someone else. He thought I wanted to play some kind of game.”
“What the hell kind of game would that be?”
She shrugged. “Who knows? Kinky sex games?”
Her mother blanched. In her jaded cop mind, kinky meant demented. She’d seen sadistic killers, and had no room to parse out sexual sadism from the sociopathic kind. They’d had that conversation after a popular movie, and Cora had given up trying to argue that there was a difference. “That doesn’t make me feel any better, Coraline.”
“I’ve already contacted the landlord to ask if he would put in an alarm system, and I got an extra dead bolt installed on both the front and back door yesterday.” She lifted her purse from the desk. “And I’m carrying my Taser in my hand wherever I go. Plus, I’m not going to be working from home for a while anyway. I landed a contract with a tech company and will be in an office filled with people.”
The tense lines in Janet’s expression softened a bit at that. “Oh. Well, that’s good at least. I hate knowing you’re working at home all day. That’s—”
“—the most popular time for burglaries. I know. I don’t answer the door and one of the guys next door works from home often anyway. I’m careful. This was just a freak thing.”
“Freak things get people killed.”
“Mom.” Cora’s patience was waning. She needed more coffee for this.
Her mom’s hands went up and she stood. “Fine. I’ll stop. For now. But I want you texting me when you get home each night. Just let me know you’re there and safe so I can sleep. And I’m sending an officer to dust for fingerprints on your porch. We might have this guy in the system already.”
“Fine.” Cora stood and arched her back, her joints popping from sitting too long. She grabbed the laptop and handed it to her mother. “I’ve sent you a file with the evidence I found on here.”
“Pay dirt?”
“Go throw a book at the bastard. And maybe cut off his balls for good measure.”
She gave her a grim look. “I was hoping this one wasn’t true.”
“Yeah, me, too.” She stepped around the desk and hiked her purse and laptop bag onto her shoulder. “I won’t be coming in for a little while if this job goes the way I expect, but if something urgent bubbles up, let me know.”
Her mom smiled at that. “Thanks. And I probably don’t say it enough, but I do appreciate what you do here. I know the pay is crap.”
“I don’t mind helping. Family legacy to get the bad guys, right?”
Janet smirked. “I said all my life I wouldn’t let you become a cop, but somehow you’re here anyway. You find interesting ways to rebel, Coraline.”
“At least I didn’t do it by trying to date one of those handsome men in uniform out there.” She tapped her chin. “Though, there’s still time. Officer Cole is looking pretty hot with that beard he’s rocking now. Is he single?”
Her mother gave her a droll look. “I take it back. Stick with this course of action. I don’t want to have to murder one of my guys.”
Cora grinned and leaned over to give her mom a kiss on the cheek. “Later, Captain.”