Baby Jane Doe. Julie Miller
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a decisive nod, Shauna set down her mug and retrieved an unmarked file from her desk. “Just so you know, I’ve cleared this with Captain Chang.”
“Cleared what? Is this about yesterday?”
“As a matter of fact, I asked him to lose any paperwork regarding your involvement in yesterday’s shooting. For now, if anyone asks, we’ll say the incident is under investigation. We can throw speculation onto the guards or even myself as the shooter.”
Eli’s gaze narrowed as she returned. “I’ve got nothing to hide. Taking down Mr. Trench Coat was a clean shoot. My report will say as much.”
“Taking down Richard Powell was a hell of a shot. KCPD has had him on their person-of-interest list as a hired gun for several months now.” She circled the table. “But forget your report. I need you on the job, not confined to a desk. As far as anyone outside this office knows, you weren’t even at that bank yesterday.”
“Why the cover-up?”
She pulled out a chair and sat across from him, concentrating for a moment on placing the file folder just so on the table in front of her. But there was no hesitation in her expression when she looked up at him. “What I’m about to ask of you won’t be easy. It won’t make you very popular with your colleagues.”
He inclined his head toward her desk. “You read my file. Does it look like popular matters to me?”
“Deep down inside—somewhere—it matters. That’s why I’ve hesitated to recruit anyone for this assignment.”
Ignoring the compassion she offered and denying any truth to her insight, Eli laced his fingers together and leaned onto the edge of the table. “What’s the job, boss lady? What do you need me to do?”
He’d wanted direct. “Are you familiar with the Baby Jane Doe murder case?”
“I’m a cop and I live in Kansas City. So, yeah, I’m familiar enough.” Relieved to have something to focus on other than the way Shauna Cartwright seemed to see a lot deeper beneath the skin than he liked a woman to, Eli eased back in his seat. “Murdered African-American girl. About a year old. I’ve heard the grisly details in the locker room. The body found separately from the head. Tossed in the dump. My sister’s the M.E. who did the autopsy. There was no sign of sexual trauma, though the COD was physical abuse. Poor kid was too young to have dental records or fingerprints to ID her. I’ve followed the news stories. How people were keeping their own kids locked in at night, how they blamed the department for taking so long to arrest anyone. I know the D.A.’s office is hashing out the preliminary motions for Donnell Gibbs’s trial right now.”
“So you are familiar with the case.” She sighed wearily, as if the details were far too familiar, maybe too personal, for her. “My first priority when I took over for Edward Brent was to put together a task force dedicated to the investigation. Actually, it was Edward’s idea, before his first stroke. He was afraid of civil unrest. Lynch mobs. Untrained citizens arming themselves against a child-killer. I organized the plan, selected the investigators and put Mitch Taylor in charge. The task force gave me Donnell Gibbs.”
Eli nodded. “Now the city’s calmed down, the killer’s on trial and we’re all heroes here at KCPD again.”
“I want to reopen the case.”
A beat of silence filled the room.
“Are you nuts?” Putting Donnell Gibbs on trial for Baby Jane Doe’s murder had finally staunched the wound that had hobbled KCPD for more than two years. Even Eli could sense the city’s massive sigh of relief. “Shauna, you can’t—”
“I’m reopening the case.” She ignored his accusatory slip of decorum and pushed the file across the table, offering Eli the most unpopular job in all of Kansas City. “And I need a man like you to do it.”
Chapter Three
“You’re giving in to anonymous threats?”
Shauna peeked over the top of her reading glasses to watch Eli set aside the last of the letters sealed in plastic evidence bags. His long, dexterous fingers tucked the pile into a neat stack before closing the folder.
“Yes, I want to find out who’s sending these.” She handed over the printouts of e-mails she’d received as well. Each and every message, from the vague comments expressing concern about the Baby Jane Doe case, to the perfunctory lists of mistakes KCPD had made in the investigation, to the most recent diatribes against the entire department’s incompetence, had been signed with nothing more than a Yours Truly. “The sender might be able to provide a lead. But I’m reopening the case because I need to know that little girl’s name.”
Eli scanned a printout, then tossed it onto the table. “Ask Donnell Gibbs.”
“He says he doesn’t know.”
“He’s lying.”
“I don’t think he is.”
“Why not?” Eli’s prove-it-to-me gaze pierced the shadows falling across the conference table as the afternoon sun shifted into evening light.
Shauna imagined that that look alone could make a witness or suspect reconsider any lack of cooperation. She imagined that that look also kept well-meaning friends and serious relationships at arm’s length. The cynicism in the smooth Scotch of Eli’s eyes aged his handsome face. And she couldn’t help but wonder how a smile, one that wasn’t laced with mockery or distrust, would mellow his carved features and dark gold irises.
Still, any compassion she felt for his lone-wolf status was irrelevant. Any fascination she felt for his tall, lean body or rich baritone voice wasn’t even allowed. Crossing her arms and rubbing at the skin chilling beneath the sleeves of her blouse was all she could do to assuage the empty ache inside her. There was another man out there—one far more mysterious and infinitely more dangerous—who demanded her attention.
“I might be the only person in all of Kansas City who feels this way…but I don’t believe Donnell Gibbs killed that girl.” Shauna pulled off her glasses and got up, trying to warm the room by turning on a desk lamp and the overhead lights. “Gibbs confessed to killing her. But the man’s a registered pedophile—and our Jane Doe wasn’t sexually assaulted.”
Eli stood as well, straightening his tie and rebuttoning his collar. “Maybe he got interrupted before he could do the deed. Or she screamed too loud and he had to shut her up before he got caught.”
“She’s younger than any of his other victims,” Shauna pointed out.
“He had a need and was desperate. Maybe he discovered a twelve-month-old was too far out of his comfort zone, and that’s why he killed her.”
Shauna crossed her arms and tilted her chin. “You have an answer for everything, don’t you.”
“I’m just pointing out what the prosecution would argue. What every cop in this town is going to argue if you reopen this case.” He picked up the stack of e-mails and held it out in his fist. “You should have reported this Yours Truly wacko the moment you got that first letter. Before it escalated to…” He shuffled through the papers to find one particular quote. “‘Our children aren’t safe. If your department can’t get the job done right, Ms. Cartwright, then I’ll do the job for them.’”
Shauna shrugged and moved to collect their empty mugs. “Do you have any idea how many complaints come through the commissioner’s office? While we address all of them, we don’t give credence to every disgruntled citizen who doesn’t like the way we do business. Being frustrated with KCPD isn’t a crime.”
He slapped the letters down on the table beside her. “This isn’t a complaint. It’s a threat.”
“I’ve read worse.” Standing close enough to detect the clean, male smells on Eli’s skin and clothes, Shauna had to crane her neck to look him in the eye. Lord, he was tall. Maybe not NBA size, but the lean cut of