Plain Jane Read Free

enough.
    He might only have an associate’s degree from a community college versus Kent’s cum laude graduation from Yale, but that did not mean the profiler was always right.
    Or even sane.
    “I’ve put up with your ‘I’m so brilliant that no one can even try to understand me’ crap.”
    He searched the profiler’s face for some reaction, but found only boredom. Kent acted as if he did not have the academy’s champion boxer at his throat. Shit, he acted as if he did not have anyone’s hands at his throat.
    Fine. If Ruben could not physically intimidate the prick, he was not beneath pushing some hot buttons.
    “And your ‘let’s pretend coming back doesn’t hurt Nicole’ routine is getting stale…”
    Ruben stopped short. His voice had cracked at her name, and he was not about to let Kent have the satisfaction of seeing him out of control.
    It had been four long years since Ruben was forced into the background as Harbinger swept into town, hijacking his first major case. Adding insult to injury, and seemingly without effort, Kent lured Nicole away as well. First a promising career, then a promising relationship had been sabotaged by the profiler.
    That was the past, Ruben reminded himself. Harbinger had been out of commission, out of their lives, for so long. In two years he thought that he’d grown enough as a detective and as Nicole’s lover to not be rattled by the profiler.
    Obviously he had been sadly mistaken. Kent, however, didn’t need to hear any of that betrayed in Ruben’s voice. Voice measured and even, he continued, “I won’t allow you to violate that woman again.”
    “If you hadn’t noticed, she’s not a woman anymore,” the profiler stated flatly. “She’s a corpse.”
    Without thinking of the consequences, Ruben bounced the back of Kent’s skull off the wall. “Because of you !”
    How could this creep have been recruited out of high school by the FBI? Reminding himself that the only upper hand he had over Harbinger was some form of emotional control, Ruben kept his anger in check.
    Instead of physically lashing out, he indicated the dozen or so cops who descended upon the scene. “We had twenty cops on alert. An alert that you insisted upon. But you could not bother to call in because—”
    “Because as good a profiler as Kent is…” Nicole elbowed her way between them, “he’s no psychic.”
    Kent shrugged as if Nicole had stated the profiler did not play the piano very well. Seemingly uncaring that just a few feet away the EMTs pronounced Joann dead. A woman who Kent failed to protect.
    “Damn it!” Ruben shoved the profiler hard against the wall, but Nicole put a hand over his closed knuckles.

CHAPTER 4
    “Ruben, come on,” Nicole coaxed. “We’ve got a canvas to roll out and—”
    “This asshole does it for the rush,” her partner growled.
    “And that outburst was helpful, exactly how?”
    Nicole knew her tone was harsh, but here was not the place to be having a testosterone-fueled standoff.
    Dozens of cops, EMTs, CSIs, and firefighters crowded the alley. All trying to pretend this little altercation wasn’t happening. Their showdown needed to end now or it was going to be on the nightly news.
    She squeezed her partner’s hand, but Ruben refused to break his stare. The profiler had really gotten to him this time.
    “Rube, please,” Nicole said, her tone more conciliatory.
    Her partner’s eyes met hers. She understood his frustration. Kent could get under your skin like bamboo shoots. However, they needed to hash out Harbinger’s difficult personality traits another time.
    “This isn’t helping.”
    Ruben shoved Kent against the wall in the same motion that released the profiler. Even so, her partner did not back away, not even a step. The two men were no longer in contact, but locked in combat nonetheless.
    Her partner stood several inches taller than Kent and had seventy pounds on the leaner profiler. Ruben was the type of guy who not only had a