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She whirled, rounded the bed and stopped.
“No!” she screamed and dropped to her knees.
Suzanne lay faceup, eyes fixated, unseeing, on the ceiling above her. Beneath her dark hair, a pool of blood soaked into the light brown carpet.
* * *
As Ethan O’Hara approached the house, the scream reverberated from within. The wide-open door and the brown bloody footprint on the front porch told him that the 911 hang up call signified real trouble. Definitely not a prank. Catelyn, his partner, pulled her gun and gave him the nod; he entered the house, his own weapon held ready in his right hand. They’d been passing by the neighborhood when the scanner went off. When Catelyn heard the address, she gasped, “That’s Marianna’s house, I think.”
“You know her?”
“I’m better friends with her sister, Alissa, but I’ve met Marianna a couple of times.”
Instead of waiting for a unit from the county, he and Catelyn had simply made a right turn into the subdivision, calling in that they would handle it.
She followed behind him, covering his back. Silently, senses on high alert, he tracked the prints.
Again he heard, “No!” coming from the back bedroom on his left.
Not wanting to call out and possibly alert the perpetrator who could still be around, he controlled his breathing, felt the familiar rush of adrenaline he always had going into a potentially dangerous situation and stepped into the bedroom.
The bed sat centered on the opposite wall. Sobs came from the right of it. He took in the debris-littered room. Someone had put up a violent fight. Catelyn came up behind him indicating the rest of the house was clean.
Lowering his gun to his side, he met her eyes, then turned back to see a woman lying on the floor beside the bed, her head resting in a stain of red. The crying came from the other woman who knelt at the figure’s side, long dark hair hiding her face.
“Ma’am?”
No response.
“Ma’am?” He touched her shoulder.
She jerked, screamed and scrambled sideways. Movement to his right brought him around and face-to-face with a German shepherd, whose sharp teeth, bared in a snarl, looked capable of tearing Ethan’s throat out.
“Easy, boy,” he soothed, backing up a step, flashing his badge to the scared woman trembling just out of reach.
“Twister, no. Sit,” the woman commanded, her voice clogged with tears.
The snarling stopped. The dog sat, popped a yawn, then, with his tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth, grinned up at Ethan.
Breathing a little easier, Ethan was able to turn his attention back to the body on the floor…and the woman whose liquid ebony eyes flicked between him and Catelyn. Catelyn moved over to see the action this side of the bed. In a gentle tone, she said, “Marianna, it’s me, Catelyn, Alissa’s friend. This is my partner, Ethan O’Hara. What happened?”
Marianna blinked, swiped a few stray tears and gave a shuddering sigh. “Oh, Catelyn. I…I don’t know. I just… came home from work and found…this…her. The front door was open and…I called 911, but couldn’t wait for help. I had to make sure she was all right, but…she’s not.”
Another muffled sob, more silent tears.
No, the woman definitely wasn’t all right. The coroner would need to make a trip out here. Ethan asked, “Who is she, your sister?” They looked enough alike.
A negative shake caused her hair to shimmer, a few strands stuck to the salty tracks on her cheeks. She brushed them aside. “My roommate. Suzanne Miller.”
Twister crawled over to rest his head on his mistress’s knee. Her slender fingers buried themselves in the animal’s silky fur.
“Who are you?” he asked.
He knew Catelyn could fill him in, but he wanted to know now. He told himself his wanting to know was strictly professional and had nothing to do with the fact that she was probably the most gorgeous woman he’d ever laid eyes on. He blinked, forcing himself to focus on her words, not her looks. Or the sound of her voice, which had an accent he couldn’t quite place.
Marianna glanced at Catelyn, then looked back at him. She said, “I’m Marianna Santino. I teach at the Palmetto State School for the Deaf across the street.”
The deaf school. He’d refused to acknowledge it as they’d passed it on their way to this subdivision. His sister had gone to school there for many years. It held a mixture of bittersweet and painful memories for him.
Looking straight at her, he said, “I hate to tell you this, Ms. Santino, but it looks like your roommate either surprised the perp…or he was after her and caught her.” He looked around, then motioned to Catelyn. “We need to get out of here. This scene’s been contaminated enough. Call it in and secure the area, will you?”
Catelyn went to do as he requested. Ethan held his hand out to the woman.
“But everyone loves Suzanne,” Marianna protested even as she accepted his helping hand. Twister stayed right beside his mistress. “She teaches kindergarten at Pine Wood Elementary School.”
“Well, it looks like she made someone really mad about something.”
* * *
Marianna missed that last part; he’d turned his head and she’d not been able to read his lips. Something about someone being mad. But who?
She followed him from the room, down the hall and out the door. What had Suzanne stumbled upon? Had she been up there all day, or had she come home early from work?
A hand on her arm brought her attention back to the man before her. His concerned blue-gray gaze narrowed, zoomed in on her. For some reason she noticed the touch of gray at his temples. “Oh, I’m sorry. You said something. I was thinking, picturing poor Suzanne…” She bit her lip. He didn’t need her to break down again. He needed her help.
“Are you with me here?”
“Yes, yes, I’m sorry.” She really needed to stop apologizing. None of this was her fault. “I’m almost deaf and need you to face me when you talk to me so I can read your lips, all right?”
Understanding flashed across his rugged features. The flicker of pain she glimpsed on his face confused her, but then it was gone and he was all business. “I need to ask you some questions, all right?”
Marianna nodded. Probably the same questions she had running through her mind. They walked to the curb, Twister trotting beside her.
Ethan asked, “Does Suzanne have any enemies?”
“No, like I said, she teaches…taught…kindergarten.”
“A fight with a boyfriend?”
“She doesn’t have a boyfriend right now. She recently broke up with a guy named Bryson James, but it was amicable.”
He jotted something in the small notebook he had pulled out. When he looked up, his electric gray-blue gaze connected with hers again and she felt a pull, sensed comfort, strength…a hidden pain?
She jolted, not wanting to feel anything right now or notice the good-looking cop sitting on her couch. Suzanne was dead, and the police needed her full attention to help solve her murder.
“Family?”
Marianna rubbed her hand across her forehead, swallowing another wave of grief. She whispered, “Her parents live here in town. They’ll be devastated.” He shifted next to her. She stared helplessly at him. “What can I do? How do I help?”
His big calloused hand reached over to take hers, his gaze intense as he said, “You’re helping in just answering the questions. Don’t leave anything out, tell me everything you know about her. The smallest detail could wind up being the biggest clue, okay? Then we’re going to have to find you a place to stay for a couple of days until we can release the scene—” he cleared his throat “—um, your house, back to you.”
Marianna nodded and sucked in a fortifying breath, and for the next hour and a half, while officers, a CSI unit, the medical examiner and the coroner paraded through her home and Suzanne’s privacy, she did her best to give Ethan O’Hara something to work with to enable him to find Suzanne’s killer.
* * *
Ethan waited while Marianna sent a text message to her parents that she would be coming to stay for a couple of nights. He was glad texting was such an in thing these days, since it made communication so much easier for the deaf. His sister would have loved the technology. Instead of dwelling on the past, however, he focused on what the crime scene investigator was saying.
“The medical examiner ruled out suicide. Ms. Miller was killed when she cracked her head on the corner of the bedside table. Blunt force trauma, if you want the official term. The M.E. said she’d do an autopsy to be sure, but she doubted she’d find anything else.”
“I’ll talk to her later. Thanks for the help and let me know if you find anything else, will you?”
“You bet, Ethan.”
Marianna walked toward him, her beauty not one bit diminished by her puffy eyes, red nose and blotchy cheeks. The grief stamped on her face pierced him. Why was it always the good ones? The ones who didn’t deserve to have their lives shattered this way? Not that anyone deserved to come face-to-face with murder, but…
Melancholy thoughts would haunt his after-hours work tonight. He smirked at that thought. What after-hours? As a homicide detective, he lived his job twenty-four/seven. Maybe if he had a family, someone to go home to at night, he’d make more of an effort to work less and spend time at home.
He smiled at her and noted the well-trained Twister at her side. Ethan commented, “He reminds me of the dogs on the K-9 squad.”
Tilting her head, she grinned. His heart slammed against his chest, and his breath whooshed from suddenly constricted lungs. Wow. Twin dimples flashed at him as her eyes crinkled at the corners. “Twister is a special dog, specially trained to be my ears. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”
Then the dimples disappeared, the brief moment of levity gone. It shocked him to realize how much he wanted her to smile again. “Do you need a ride to your parents’ house?”
“No, but thank you. My brother, Joseph, is on the way to pick me up. He’s home, visiting. My mother let him know I needed a ride, but she didn’t tell him why.” Her hands clasped in front of her, she kept her eyes on his face. She looked lost, shell-shocked.
The urge to gather her in his arms singed him. Instead, he cleared his throat. “Why didn’t she tell him?”
Well-shaped shoulders lifted in a shrug. “A lot of reasons. The main one being the safety of the other drivers on the road between her house and mine.”
“Right. Okay, well, there’s nothing else we can do here.”
He placed a hand on her shoulder, felt a tremble run through her.
Don’t do something dumb, O’Hara, like hug her.
He pulled her to him for a brief moment, patted her back, then stepped back. The surprise on her face matched the disbelief he felt. He’d hugged her. Now why did he go and do that? What was it about her that had him tossing his professional detachment to the wind? She offered him a small smile filled with gratitude.
Swallowing his rampant thoughts and emotions, he realized he’d only just met the woman and was getting in deep, reacting with his heart, instead of his head. Clearing his throat, he said, “Hey, it’ll be all right. Everything will work out, okay?”
Unblinking identical vats of chocolate stared up at him.
Her eyes made him think of Hershey’s—and kisses… and not necessarily the candy kind. She asked, “Will I see you again?”
“Oh, yeah, I think that’s definitely going to happen.” He didn’t realize he’d spoken the words aloud until he watched the flush rise from her neck to her cheeks.
Oops.
Catelyn stomped the mud off her shoes, diverting his attention from the woman in front of him. When he looked to the door, Marianna did likewise.
His partner said, “I’ve questioned all the neighbors I could find.” Her lips twisted in disgust. “Nobody saw anything. Her next-door neighbor was home from work with the flu. Said he heard a crashing sound sometime this morning but felt too bad to get up to see what it was.”
Ethan’s eyes sharpened, “Probably that trash can that was overturned. Check that out to make sure he didn’t dump anything.”
A car turned into the drive. He turned back to Marianna. “I think your ride has arrived.”
Marianna winced. “You mean trouble has arrived.”
TWO
How was she supposed to go back to a normal life? Marianna had taken off yesterday and the day before, calling in sick and staying at her parents’ house, she and Twister fortunate enough to be wrapped up in her mother’s love and concern. Now it was Friday morning and she was on her way to the school. According to Suzanne’s mother, the autopsy had been finished and her funeral was tomorrow.
But, first, Marianna had to make it through today. She’d chosen to go to work instead of sitting around thinking about the brutal loss of her friend, so she was expected to teach without falling apart. But how? My strength is in You, Lord. Please get me through this day.
The day of the murder, Joseph, her eldest brother, had picked up her and Twister up from her small house and taken them to her childhood home, drilling her like a dentist for the entire ten-minute drive. When she’d said trouble had arrived, she should have said the Spanish Inquisition had been revived.
She chalked it up to his being an FBI agent and the boredom of vacationing having set in. And the fact that someone had just killed his baby sister’s roommate. Concern came naturally for him, overprotectiveness his first instinct. One of the reasons her mother hadn’t told him about the murder when she’d ask him to pick her up. Joseph could handle just about any situation with a coolheaded professionalism except when it came to his baby sister.
It drove her nuts.
Throughout her entire childhood and most of her adult years she had fought to prove she could take care of herself and to get her family to stop hovering simply because she was deaf. She was just glad Joseph had agreed to go get her car yesterday afternoon. Being stuck without transportation made her feel trapped, like a bird with clipped wings.
She’d snuck out this morning, avoiding her mother’s delicious-smelling breakfast. When she’d considered eating, her stomach had lurched in protest. The only thing she’d been able to force down yesterday had been soup and some fruit.
As the school building came into view, she glanced across the street at the entrance to her neighborhood. Would it hurt to drive by? Just to see? A quick glance at the clock told her she’d be late if she did. Resisting the urge to spin the wheel to the right, she entered the campus. Waving to the guard at the entrance, she made her way down the road, cut a right into the first parking lot she came to and whipped into an empty spot.
The building where she taught sat up on a hill. A big hill. Unfortunately, some brilliant architect had designed the nice building but neglected to add a parking area anywhere near it. Hence the lower-level parking and the breath-stealing hike to her classroom.
At least she got her exercise every day. Grabbing her ever-present backpack from the passenger seat of her car, she slammed the door and began the ascent. Other staff members were in the process of arriving and several waved.
“Marianna!”
She turned at the sound of her name. Julie had obviously been calling it a few times as the woman rushed up to her, panting, bending over to catch her breath. “I keep forgetting you can’t hear people yelling at you.”
Marianna laughed for the first time since Suzanne’s death. Julie Thomas, friend and fellow teacher, could always be counted on to produce a smile. “Nope. You just have to hit the right pitch. How long have you been calling me?”
Julie shot her a dark look. “Long enough.” A frown knitted her blond eyebrows together. Sucking in a deep breath, she said, “Okay, I can finally breathe again.”
She waved toward the hill they still had to climb. Fortunately, some bright soul had taken pity on the Green Hall staff and had built steps into the side of the hill. Marianna headed for them, watching Julie’s lips and listening intently as her friend asked, “Are you all right? I mean, I can’t believe someone broke into your house and killed Suzanne. It’s just…”
“Insane?” Marianna asked quietly.
“Yes. That’s the only word for it.” Thankfully, while Julie had her funny side, she could be serious when the time called for it. Marianna felt Julie’s hand on her arm. She stopped walking and looked around into her friend’s green eyes, which held a sheen of compassion-induced tears. “Truly, are you all right?”
Sighing, Marianna leaned over to give the concerned woman a hug. “No, I’m not all right yet, but with God’s help and by finding Suzanne’s killer, I will be,” she whispered. “I have to be.”
They finished the walk to the two-story building in silence. Julie went to the bottom floor, which contained the middle school. Marianna went upstairs to the multi-handicapped school. The middle school students were on an academic track that would prepare them for college. The students in the multi-handicapped school were on the occupational track. They would find themselves with a job suited to their needs and live either with family or in a group home.
And while their IQs might not be the highest, they still had a great love for socialization. In fact, most of her students were just like any other teenagers, discussing the current television programs and the newest dance, and using the latest technology to communicate with each other. The school was a great place and Marianna loved it.
