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Dangerously Attractive
Jenna Ryan
A serial killer is targeting Detective Vanessa Connor's oldest friends, and evidence–the sicko left his calling card in her home–shows she's the next victim.But Vanessa refuses to run scared. She's a cop. And she's determined to make full use of her years on the force to trap the murderer herself. So when a federal agent is assigned to protect her and catch the perp, Vanessa isn't exactly cooperative.She doesn't need a bodyguard–particularly one as dangerously attractive, dangerously seductive as Rick Maguire. His powerful arms make Vanessa feel safer than she wants to admit. Especially when the killer gets close enough to cross them both off his list.
“You realize you’re pushing the boundaries, don’t you, Maguire?” Vanessa asked.
“Duty-wise as well as in other ways.”
“Story of my life, Detective Connor.” His lips were an inch from hers when he spoke.
Damn, she thought as little zips of lightning began to shoot through her system. She actually wanted him to bridge that last bit of space and kiss her. On the other hand…“Gonna drive me crazy,” she predicted and, tangling her fingers in his hair, dragged his mouth onto hers.
Jenna Ryan
Dangerously Attractive
To Shelley most of all. Loved. Missed. Remembered.
To James McCowan, my healer.
To Bailey, for the joy.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jenna Ryan loves creating dark-haired heroes, heroines with strength and good murder mysteries. Ever since she was young, she has had an extremely active imagination. She considered various careers over the years and dabbled in several of them, until the day her sister Kathy suggested she put her imagination to work and write a book. She enjoys working with intriguing characters and feels she is at her best writing romantic suspense. When people ask her how she writes, she tells them by instinct. Clearly it’s worked, since she’s received numerous awards from Romantic Times BOOKreviews. She lives in Canada and travels as much as she can when she’s not writing.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Vanessa Connor—A San Francisco homicide detective who attended Berkeley College. She’s marked for death.
Rick Maguire—An FBI agent assigned to track down a serial killer while he protects Vanessa.
Bobby Valley—He owns a day spa in Haight-Ashbury, and he knows all the Berkeley victims.
Orrin O’Malley—An aspiring politician, he had many secrets at Berkeley.
Geri Kruger—A friend now, she was jealous of Vanessa and her friends at college.
Willis Reed—Former Berkeley professor, now presumed dead. But is he?
Edna Reed—Does the professor’s wife know more than she’s letting on?
Senator Graham—His niece was an embarrassment to him. Now she’s dead.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Prologue
Wisps of black fog drifted in and out of Vanessa Connor’s head. They obscured the face of a man she desperately wanted to see. She called his name, but that only added knife blades to the darkness. The shiny tips jabbed gleefully at the edges of her brain.
It was like a dream, but not really. Someone had hit her, caught her hard with the butt end of a gun. As the darkness began to crack, vague memories slithered in to hiss at her.
The walls around her groaned. She heard a bird croaking overhead. “Beware,” it warned again and again.
With an enormous effort, Vanessa clawed her way through one of the cracks and forced her eyes open. Think, she ordered herself. Breathe. Focus.
Because the literal darkness hadn’t altered, the only thing she could focus on was a tattered spiderweb in the corner of a high, rectangular window. The air smelled damp, vaguely musty. The bird’s voice floated downward again.
“Don’t talk to strangers!”
Having succeeded in raising her head, Vanessa let it fall back. She stared at the unfinished ceiling. Cobwebs dangled like broken threads. Her mind became a whirlpool, sucking in thoughts and tossing them back out at random.
She pictured the man again. Was he calling her name? Probably. Would he find her here in this dank northern California cellar? Unlikely.
On a more chilling note, she recalled four dead women, college friends once who’d turned into strangers with the passing years.
She visualized their killer. Her killer unless she could find a way out of here. But the ropes around her wrists were cinched tight, and the ones binding her ankles weren’t much looser.
Behind her, the cellar door creaked. A protracted silence followed. Then a foot hit the first stair tread.
Vanessa’s heart thumped. She counted the steps, fourteen to the bottom. And finally…
“Hello, Vanessa.” The disembodied voice was soft, like a caress. Oh, but there was a definite whip of fury in her name.
The eerie approach continued, leather soles on the smooth concrete floor. Gradually, a form took shape. A gun emerged from the darkness. A hand appeared and caught her chin. The fingers that dug in jerked Vanessa’s head higher. Cold eyes glittered down at her.
“Awake and aware, are we, Sleeping Beauty? I must have hit you harder than I realized. But then I’m so close to the end, you see, so very, very close.”
The killer’s face came into view. Smiling lips dipped to kiss her left cheek, then her right.
“You glow, even in the dark, Vanessa. Such a temptation for a weak, mortal male.”
Vanessa knew better than to react. Any sign of fear or revulsion would send the killer over the edge. Of what, she wasn’t sure, since insanity was a given at this point and mercy an impossible dream.
“Watch out!” the distant bird shrilled, and the killer laughed.
“I’ll shoot that crow before I leave.”
“But…”
“For fun. For the sake of confusion. Because I hate birds. But not as much as I hate you.” The hand holding the gun rose, touched Vanessa’s forehead. “Say your prayers, gorgeous.” The freakish smile returned. “You have five short seconds. Then you’re dead.”
Chapter One
Two weeks earlier…
“Hi, Van. Working late?” A woman in a blue linen suit smiled as she passed Vanessa near the nerve center of police headquarters. “Whoa, wait a minute.” She hooked a hand through Vanessa’s arm. “That’s awfully formal detective gear you’re wearing.”
“I’m off duty.” Vanessa slipped out of her pinstriped jacket, baring her arms to the relative cool of the station house air. “I swear the temperature hasn’t dropped five degrees since sunset.”
“Uh-huh.” A suspicious light entered the other woman’s eyes. “You’ve been in court, haven’t you?”
Vanessa couldn’t resist a smile as she pushed through the door. “Guilty, Counselor Kruger.”
“Testifying against my partner’s client?”
“He robbed a credit union at closing time, Ger. He was red-faced, high, and he stabbed one of the tellers.”
“With a needle.”
“Which he claimed was infected with HIV. Makes it armed robbery. I was questioning the manager about another matter. I heard the threat, saw the guy who uttered it. I testified.”
Geri’s perky features lost their light. “I gave Ted that client so he could test his legal wings. I should have checked the witness list first.” She smacked Vanessa’s hip. “Who’d expect a homicide detective to be lurking around a credit union at closing time?”
“What can I say, we’re unpredictable creatures.”
Geri’s gaze shifted. “Who’s the gorgeous guy in Palmer’s office?”
Vanessa swung her head to see. The captain’s verticals were up, and by the light of his desk lamp she spied a tall, dark-haired man. He was dressed entirely in black and that dark hair was actually long enough to skim his shoulders. Even at a distance and behind dusty glass, his features were—well, arresting was as good a description as any, she supposed, though sexy might have sprung to mind in different circumstances.
Geri smoothed her skirt. “Who is he, Van? New cop on the block? Because if he is, I’m going to be representing a lot more clients from around here. Not that it’ll help me since he’ll take one look at you and go blind.”
“Excuse me?”
“Not Medusa blind, I mean blinded by your beauty.”
Vanessa grinned. “Apparently you didn’t see me and three other detectives hiding in a Dumpster two weeks ago. It took five long, hot showers to get the cabbage smell out of my hair.”
Sighing, Geri transferred her attention from the mystery man’s face to Vanessa’s. “You could sleep in a bed of cabbage every night and men would line up from here to the Mexican border to shampoo your hair. Let’s do it this way. You don’t want the guy, for whatever reason, tell him about this public defense lawyer you know and how she and her husband split up recently, and she’s looking for a little fun.” Her expression clouded. “Talking of fun, and I know the comparison sounds callous, but I heard about Deirdre Morton and Sandy Lewis.”
All amusement faded. “Did you also hear about Mara Chan?”
“Oh my God, Mara, too? Where did they find her? Was she still in Hong Kong?”
“She left Hong Kong in July. She’d just moved to Houston to work for one of the airlines.”
“You must be so freaked.”
“Say nervous,” Vanessa replied, although truthfully, it went far deeper than that.
She’d known the victims well in college. With the exception of Mara, she hadn’t seen any of them for years, but that didn’t diminish the haze of fear that tended to creep in whenever she lowered her guard.
“I spoke to Mara a week after she landed in Houston. We talked about going to Deirdre’s funeral, then found out there wasn’t going to be one, just a small family gathering in Chicago.”
Geri shook her head. “From what I remember of Deirdre Morton, she liked big bashes. If her spirit’s hanging around, it’ll be plenty pissed off. First she’s murdered behind a cheap bar, then her family gives her a subdued send-off.” She laid a hand on Vanessa’s arm. “No heartlessness intended, but you were tight with these women once. If you’re not scared, then I will be for you. Palmer must be tearing out what’s left of his hair.”
Vanessa seesawed her hand. “He suggested I take a leave. When I reminded him that Sandy Lewis was killed on vacation in Scottsdale, he backed off. If someone wants me dead, Ger, he’ll find me, whether I’m here in San Francisco or camping at the base of Mount Everest.”
“Yes, but Everest would be a harder reach.”
“I’m not running.”
“I’m not surprised. I have to say, though, for the first time in my life, I’m happy to have only been part of the wannabe ‘in’ crowd at Berkeley. How many others were in your clique?”
A trace of irritation marred Vanessa’s features. “We weren’t a clique, just friends.” She moved a shoulder and returned her gaze to the captain’s office. “Sylvia Porter.”
“Right. Can’t forget her. Oh, now she was really snotty.”
“Spoiled,” Vanessa amended.
“To the point of rot.” Geri fanned her face with her hand. “Where’s she living these days?”
“Palmer’s having her tracked, but there’s no address on her after five years ago and no family to ask since her father died and her stepmother couldn’t care less about her.”
“So poor Snow White has flitted off to some unknown tropical forest to drown her sorrows in money, booze and, I’m sure, far more than seven little men.”
“I thought you were happy to be part of the wannabe ‘in’ crowd.”
