Dead Ringer Read Free Page B

gift," Tess offered.
    "Maybe." Sometimes the odd detail in a case could
bother him for days or weeks. He'd had an apparent suicide last year. The man
appeared to have shot himself. The house was clean, everything in its place.
Only the man's tie and suit jacket were dumped in a sloppy heap on the floor.
No big deal. But the detail just hadn't fit the picture. Jacob had sat at that
crime scene a long time before he reasoned the man had dumped the clothes in a
final act of rebellion.
    And
now he had an expensive charm around the neck of a woman who looked like she
shopped at discount stores. It could be nothing, like the discarded clothes.
But it still bothered him.
    "I'll
check on the charm," Zack said.
    Jacob
nodded as he stared at the woman. Despite the ravages of death and the
elements, he still felt as if he'd seen Jane Doe before. "She looks familiar to
me."
    Tess
nodded. "I thought the same thing. Been trying to place her
since I first got a look at her face."
    How
did he know her?
    Tess
gently placed her fingertips under the woman's chin and turned her face toward
them.
    The
full-on view of her face startled him. Recognition dawned.
    Jane
Doe...Ruth.
    She
looked like the news anchorwoman on Channel 10 News. Kendall Shaw.

Chapter
Two
    Tuesday, January 8, 10:10 A.M.
    A woman's screams echoed in the child's ears as she huddled in a corner
of a closet, her legs curled so tightly under her skirt that they cramped. She
clutched her hands over her ears and panted. Sweat clung to her skin.
    "Make the screaming stop," she whispered to herself. "Make it stop."
    And then, in an instant, the terrified screams did stop. An eerie
silence descended. The child raised her head. Light seeped in under the door
frame, and in the silence she heard the steady sound of footsteps approach the
door. The door handle turned.
    "Come out, come out wherever you are." The voice was soothing, soft, yet
terrifying.

    The
dream had awoken Kendall Shaw last night at two o'clock and had left her so
shaken she'd not been able to get back to sleep. A dull headache now pounded
behind her eyes.
    The
reoccurring dream had plagued her on and off for months now. She'd thought the
dream had been a by-product of last summer's shoulder surgery and the
heavy-duty pain meds her trauma surgeon had prescribed. But she'd nearly
completed physical therapy and had weaned herself off the drugs within weeks of
the surgery.
    And
still the frequency and violence of the dreams had increased. Always they left
her panicked and wide awake. Each time she got up out of bed and went
downstairs and checked all the doors and windows. Always they were locked, but
she never felt reassured.
    Even
now, the memory made her heart race and her hands sweat.
    "Enough,"
Kendall muttered as she rubbed her shoulder. "Get hold of yourself." She
reached for the aspirin bottle in the cabinet by her kitchen sink, flipped open
the lid, and popped two into her mouth. She gulped down the water and set the
glass down on the counter. "Stupid, absurd dream."
    For
the last five months, she'd been the evening news anchor at Channel 10 News.
Ratings had soared since she'd started anchoring and there was talk about
giving her a local talk show.
    Kendall
checked her slim wristwatch. Ten-fifteen. Most days
she didn't arrive at the television station until three. Once there she briefly
met with producers, the assignment editor, sometimes the news director, and any
available reporters to discuss the day's news. They discussed what stories each
reporter was covering and which would be included in the newscast. After that
she touched up hair and makeup and then taped promos for the news that night.
    It
was still way too early to leave for work, but she was restless and in need of
work's distraction. "Nicole, I'm leaving!" she shouted.
    Last
summer Kendall had been chasing the story of a serial killer. Nicole had been
running from an abusive husband. Both had nearly lost their lives at the hands
of these two evil