Plain Jane Read Free Page A

gym membership but who actually used it. Whereas Kent relied upon his genetic heritage to keep fit.
    Despite her partner’s clear physical advantage, Kent seemed completely ignorant of Ruben’s towering presence. And there was nothing that annoyed her partner more than being discounted. Nicole made sure to position herself between them as Kent leaned his head back against the wall. As if the profiler might take a nap.
    Nicole hesitated as the air stilled. Activity buzzed all around, yet an eerie calm blanketed the area. The CSI camera flashes added strobe. Faster and faster. They too must have sensed the change in the air. A storm approached. A storm that would wash away vital evidence.
    Reminded of the real issue, Nicole set her jaw. The boys were just going to have to suck it up.
    “Now if you two are done—”
    Then Kent did the unthinkable. He yawned.
    Nicole wedged herself deeper between them before Ruben’s shock transformed into anger. While she was trying to think of something, anything, to defuse Ruben’s increasingly short temper, her cell phone rang.
    Nicole flipped open the phone. “Usher.”
    “Status?” Her boss asked.
    “I’m sorry, Captain .” Nicole stressed the last word to keep Ruben in check. “Joann Forme, the woman Kent had under surveillance, is dead.”
    Nicole heard a loud sigh on the other end. Followed by a long pause. Her captain believed in counting to ten before responding to bad news.
    “Are you going to explain that despite a trained FBI officer providing round-the-clock surveillance and twenty officers on call within a mile of this woman, somehow the killer was still able to get to her?”
    “I promise you, sir. We will explain tonight’s events.”
    “Within the hour.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    She snapped the phone closed, harder than she intended. “We’re due back by two, so let’s direct our hostilities toward the killer, all right?”
    Ruben glanced at Kent, who still stared up at the brooding clouds. Finally her partner gave a stiff nod and strode over to the beat cop who discovered the grisly scene.
    Nicole waited long enough to make sure that the cop held Ruben’s attention before she turned back to Kent, but the profiler had vanished.
    Immediately she looked at Joann. Luckily he had not gone back to the body. She searched the growing crowd of blue uniforms, but no sign of him.
    Besides being the special agent who had apprehended the highest number of serial killers in the last decade, Harbinger’s other specialty was disappearing when things did not go his way.
    Desperate, Nicole looked down the alley in the opposite direction and found Kent’s retreating form.
    Nicole trotted to catch up. “Where in the hell do you think you’re going?”
    Kent ignored her. She grabbed his arm. Why did he always make her run after him? Why did he always make her feel like a little girl trying to get an absent daddy’s attention?
    “Damn it, you are not going to leave me to answer to Glick alone.” Kent tried to walk away. This time Nicole jerked him so hard that he had to face her. She was done chasing.
    “Not again .”

CHAPTER 5
    Kent stared blankly at Nicole even though he knew exactly the shared past she meant. Not only did he know the reference but took her accusation like a kick to the ‘nads.
    Anger flared. At the killer, at himself, even at Nicole for dragging him back into a case like this.
    Joann’s sticky blood dripped from his hands. The metallic taste lingered on his lips. A woman he had grown to know more intimately than most husbands know their wives had been killed on his watch. How could Nicole expect him to stand here and have a normal conversation? If he opened his emotions even a crack, the dam would break. He would break.
    A profiler was not allowed that luxury. As long as the Plain Jane killer was still on the loose, Kent had to contain his anger, his pain. He had to bottle it and use it as fuel to drive him deeper into the killer’s mind.
    Closer to