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  “I guess our cold case isn’t so cold anymore, is it, Brannigan?” Valdez happily asked his partner.

  “That’s the working theory,” Hunter responded. Realizing that introductions might be in order, he said to his partner, “Detective Jason Valdez, meet Detective McKenzie Cavanaugh. I take it you two have already met,” he said, nodding at Choi.

  Valdez glanced over his shoulder at the other man. He grinned broadly at Hunter. “Hell, we’re best buddies,” Valdez cracked.

  “You two really are lonely up there, aren’t you?” Choi observed. He looked at his partner and pointed to the laptop she had in her hands. “What’s that?”

  “This is the laptop that Connie Kurtz didn’t know her father had, and hopefully, it’s also the key to unlocking the mystery of how a lonely old widower wound up losing his head in the middle of Aurora Park,” Kenzie told her partner. “Literally.”

  At that moment, Hunter’s cell rang, emitting a jarring noise that sounded like an old-fashioned dial phone.

  Kenzie frowned, thinking it was one of the detective’s many girlfriends.

  Her mood didn’t improve when he held up his hand to prevent her from talking while he listened to whatever it was that the person on the other end of the call was saying to him.

  Chapter 10

  By the time Hunter put his cell phone away, Kenzie was more than mildly annoyed. She had just started thinking of him as a decent detective, but the call she’d just witnessed had instantly demoted him back to useless playboy status.

  She could barely keep her temper in check. “You need to tell your girlfriends that you can’t accept their calls until you’re off duty, Brannigan,” Kenzie informed him briskly.

  “Girlfriends?” Hunter repeated, his handsome brow wrinkling with a touch of confusion.

  “Don’t act so innocent, Brannigan. I’m talking about whoever just called you.” Exasperated, she waved her hand at the pocket where he’d tucked away his cell.

  “Oh.” And then he grinned at Kenzie as if he’d just realized what she had mistakenly thought. “Sorry.” And then he told her, “But the ME’s really not my type.”

  “The ME?” It was Kenzie’s turn to be confused by the subject of their conversation. “You mean Doc Rayburn?”

  “Yes,” Hunter told her. “That was who called just now. You remember the ME, don’t you?” he asked. “The poor guy who was on the receiving end of all those body parts that we just dumped in his morgue.”

  Kenzie’s partner glanced at her and it was obvious that Choi thought this wasn’t going to end well, so he ran interference.

  “Why was the ME calling?” Choi asked, tactfully.

  “Glad you asked,” Hunter said. “It seems that even though the doc is dealing with headless torsos, he was able to make an ID.”

  Kenzie’s brow furrowed. “How’s that possible?”

  Hunter turned in her direction. “Apparently our serial killer should have been lopping off his victims’ legs, as well, because one of the bodies the dog found had an artificial hip put in,” he told the other three detectives.

  For the first time since he’d become part of the task force, Hunter saw Kenzie really smile. He caught himself thinking that she really could light up a room and he wondered if she was even aware of that.

  “And artificial hips come with serial numbers that are registered in databanks,” Kenzie cried excitedly.

  “Nice to know that if my uncle Oscar ever turns up dead during one of his many ‘global excursions,’ they’ll be able to identify him and ship him back to my aunt Rosa,” Valdez commented.

  “The wonders of medicine,” Kenzie commented to Hunter’s partner. She did her best to tamp down her eagerness as she asked Hunter, “So what’s the victim’s name?”

  “I don’t know,” Hunter admitted.

  “What do you mean you don’t know?” Kenzie demanded. “He just called you.”

  “The ME wants to tell us in person,” Hunter told her, his tone a great deal calmer than Kenzie’s was.

  Kenzie took a deep breath, managing to get a grip on herself.

  “Fair enough,” she allowed. And then, she asked sarcastically, “Mind if I come along since you and Rayburn seem to be such good buddies?”

  “Sure,” Hunter answered. Then, unable to resist, he said as they left the back room, “Aw, Kenzie. Don’t be jealous. I’m just less intimidating to the poor guy than you are.”

  He watched in fascination as storm clouds gathered in her eyes.

  “I am not intimidating,” Kenzie informed him as she strode ahead of him and out of the squad room again.

  Tickled, Hunter began to laugh in response to the sound of her annoyed tone.

  Kenzie glared at the man who was swiftly becoming her nemesis.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked. And then she answered her own question. “You think I’m intimidating, is that it?”

  He didn’t have to fake surprise. Was that a serious question? “Have you met you?” he asked.

  Intimidating? How could he say such a thing? “I don’t intimidate you,” she pointed out.

  No, she didn’t, he thought. But there was a reason for that.

  “When I was a kid, for a time I was raised by a tough old grandmother,” he told her as they got on the elevator again. “She buried three husbands—I’m assuming they were dead at the time but I’m not a hundred percent positive of that,” he added with a chuckle. “Grandma took no garbage from anyone and if she’s still out there somewhere, I’m sure that woman can still drink any five guys under the table. She also had a mouth like a sailor, so no, you don’t intimidate me—but then, I’m a unique case.”

  She sighed. He would think that, she thought. “You are a case all right,” she told Hunter.

  The elevator went straight down to the basement without any stops.

  “You know,” she said as she watched the numbers become lower, “I’m beginning to think we should just relocate to the basement to save ourselves the travel time.”

  “And deprive me of our cozy few minutes together?” Hunter asked, indicating the elevator car.

  “You’re not funny,” Kenzie informed him.

  “I wasn’t trying for funny,” he told her in a low voice that seemed to seductively skim along her skin before it faded away.

  Walking out of the elevator, Kenzie did her best to shake off the lingering effects the sound of his sexy voice had created. She was well aware of his reputation and she was not about to buy into the man’s act.

  “Focus on the case, Brannigan. Amateur hour is over,” she informed him just before she pushed open the door to the morgue with the flat of her hand.

  “Amateur hour, eh?” he repeated with a very unsettling laugh. Leaning in, he promised, “To be picked up later.”

  “Not if I can help it,” she murmured under her breath. Raising her voice as she walked toward the medical examiner, Kenzie asked, “So what’s so special that you had to tell us in person instead of over the phone, Doc?”

  “Something to knock your socks off—if you had on socks,” Rayburn amended, glancing at Kenzie’s long, bare legs before continuing. “Either one of you familiar with the name Anthony Pagliotti?” he asked, looking from one to the other.

  The name meant nothing to her. “Should we be?” Kenzie asked.

  “He’s the opera singer who fell off the face of the earth after he lost his voice, isn’t he?” Hunter asked the doctor.

  “Looks like Detective Brannigan gets the gold star,” Rayburn announced with a flourish, pleased as well as duly impressed.

  Kenzie stared at the man next to her. “How would you know who he is?” she questioned Hunter.

  “My grandmother had a cultured side,” the detective said matter-of-factly. “It was small, but it was loud,” he added.

  She was getting to know a
lot more about her new temporary partner than she’d thought she would. Kenzie wasn’t sure she was happy about that state of affairs. As long as she thought of him as a walking egotist, she could ignore him. But the more human he became, the harder he would be to write off.

  Turning away from Hunter, she addressed the ME. “Okay, so what about this opera singer?”

  “As Brannigan said,” Rayburn said, starting over, “he went missing.” The medical examiner paused, then said almost like a game show announcer, “Until now.”

  Hunter looked down at the skeletal remains on the ME’s table. “This is him?”

  Rayburn nodded. “What’s left of him after a decade. Looks like he ran afoul of your serial killer,” the doctor pronounced.

  “Are you sure that this opera singer was killed by the same person?” Kenzie asked. She looked dubiously at the remains.

  Rayburn reviewed his findings. “Same MO, same kind of cuts made to separate the man’s head from his torso, so yes, I’d say this is the work of the same suspect—whoever that might be,” the medical examiner interjected.

  Kenzie’s eyes were almost sparkling as she appraised the torso laid out on Rayburn’s table. “This is really helpful, Doc. The more information we have, the more chances we’ll have to find the killer.” Her mind was already racing ahead. “We’ll start interviewing the people Pagliotti knew,” she said as she began to leave.

  “He was a recluse,” Hunter told her, putting a pin in her balloon.

  Another reclusive victim, Kenzie thought. “I’m sensing a pattern here. Still, there’s got to be someone we can talk to about this man,” she insisted. “You just said he was once famous, so maybe he had die-hard fans, or maybe—”

  “Um, Detectives?” Rayburn called after them as they were about to walk out the door. When they turned around to face him, the medical examiner said, “I haven’t quite finished being helpful yet.”

  Kenzie immediately strode back to the doctor. Hunter was just behind her.

  “There’s something else about our reclusive opera singer?” she asked Rayburn, thinking that the man was doling out evidence for dramatic effect.

  “No. This is about another one of the bodies,” Rayburn answered.

  “Another victim with an artificial hip?” Hunter guessed.

  The medical examiner scrunched up his face. “Not quite as definitive,” he told them. Since he had no other way to identify the incomplete bodies, he gave them each a number. “Torso number five isn’t nearly as badly decomposed as the others. Number five has tattoos all over his chest. Very unique tattoos,” Rayburn specified.

  Leading the pair over to one of the metal drawers, he opened it to illustrate his point. “I doubt if there are too many places that have tattoo artists who can do renditions of Madonna and Child of this impressive quality,” he told them.

  Hunter looked down at the decorated torso. Most of it was still in rather good condition. “This one hasn’t been dead all that long, has he?”

  “No. A month, tops, would be my educated guess,” Rayburn told them. “I’m still waiting for some results to come back from the lab, but while we wait, I’d say that you stand a good chance of putting a name to this one, as well.”

  Hunter exchanged looks with Kenzie and nodded at what the doctor had just told them. “Anything else?” he asked the medical examiner.

  “Just that all the victims you brought me have one thing in common,” Rayburn replied. “They are all men,” Rayburn told them, then said with emphasis, “older Caucasian men.”

  There was silence for a moment, and then Hunter put into words what they were all thinking. “Looks like our serial killer might have some very serious ‘daddy’ issues.”

  Kenzie bit her lower lip, mulling the theory over in her head. On the surface, it fit the preponderance of victims to a T. But maybe the matter was even simpler than that.

  “Either that or it’s just that older men offer a great deal less resistance, aren’t as quick to flee, can be easily overpowered and, in general, they put up less of a fight,” Kenzie concluded. She looked at Hunter, waiting for him to counter her theory.

  Rayburn listened to what she had to say thoughtfully. “You just might have a point there,” the doctor agreed.

  “I’ll send someone from the task force to take photos of that tattoo—” she pointed toward the work of art on the torso “—and make the rounds of the tattoo parlors with them, see if they can turn up something,” Kenzie told the medical examiner.

  His attention had been captured by her first sentence. “A task force,” Rayburn repeated with a nod of approval. “Is this your first one, Kenzie?” he asked.

  She was about to say yes, but that would have been misleading. The last thing that she wanted to do was say something that Brannigan could wind up holding over her head, taunting her with.

  “Not exactly,” she answered. “It’s a joint task force.”

  “Joint?” Rayburn echoed, his eyes darting toward the detective standing next to her.

  Hunter confirmed the doctor’s unspoken question. “I’m her better half,” he said.

  Kenzie was quick to clarify the statement. “Euphemistically speaking.”

  Rayburn nodded in response and chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he told her, and Kenzie had the uneasy feeling that the ME was politely saying that he didn’t believe her protestations.

  “Let us know if you come up with anything else,” Hunter told the doctor.

  Because the medical examiner had called Brannigan and not her, she assumed he had misplaced her cell number. She took the proper precaution. Taking out a card, she pressed it into Rayburn’s hand.

  “Call me if you find anything else. Day or night. The time doesn’t matter. Call me,” Kenzie instructed.

  Rayburn looked down at the card and then at Hunter, as if silently asking for his thoughts on the matter.

  “What she said,” Hunter told the medical examiner, adding, “Call her or I’ll never hear the end of it.” And then he grinned.

  Why did she constantly feel that he was having fun at her expense? She’d never met anyone who made her feel so undermined in her life.

  “Stop grinning, Brannigan, or someone’s going to mistake you for a hyena,” she retorted.

  “I doubt it,” Hunter answered and went right on grinning. He couldn’t help getting a kick out of how hard she was trying to keep the barriers up between them.

  * * *

  “Choi, take your camera and go down to the morgue,” Kenzie said the moment she walked into the back room the task force had been given.

  Choi was momentarily caught off guard. Recovering, he said, “I don’t know what you heard, but I’m not into that kind of kinky stuff.”

  “This isn’t kinky stuff,” she informed her partner, ignoring Hunter, who was stifling a laugh. “I need you to take pictures of one of the victim’s tattoos. It’s a distinct one. The doc will show you which victim. Once you have a good set of photographs, I want you to hit all the local tattoo parlors to see if you can find the artist who did them. Maybe we’ll get lucky and get a third name for our list.”

  Resigned, Choi rose from the table. “And when I got up this morning, I thought it was going to be just another day in paradise.”

  “Instead, you get to earn your keep,” Kenzie told the thin, dark-haired detective with a tight smile. When she turned toward the other two men who were left in the room, she saw that Hunter was wearing the same smile he had been earlier. “What?” she asked, bracing herself.

  Hunter’s eyes met hers. “Like I said before. Intimidating.”

  Mentally, she counted to ten, then informed Hunter, “Choi went because I’m in charge, not because he’s afraid of me.”

  “Sure,” Hunter agreed. “That sounds good, too.”

  She knew Brannigan was humoring her, but she didn’t ha
ve any time to butt heads or argue with the infuriating man. There was a serial killer loose out there, preying on old, lonely men from the looks of it, and she was determined to find and stop him.

  She turned toward Brannigan’s partner. “Valdez, why don’t you see what you can find out about Anthony Pagliotti—if he adhered to a schedule, who saw him last, if anyone ever declared him to be missing or filed a report to that effect.”

  Valdez slanted a look toward Hunter, waiting for the latter to say the same thing to him. He wasn’t disappointed.

  “You heard the detective,” Hunter said. “Start digging.”

  “Okay,” Valdez said, backing out of the room. “I’ll just go find a computer to log on to.”

  Once Valdez had left the room, Hunter turned around to look at Kenzie. His eyes slowly and carefully washed over her face and body before he finally spoke.

  “Okay, now that you’ve got me alone, just what did you have in mind for us to do?” he asked in a low, particularly seductive voice.

  “You must be the only person alive who can make detective work sound like a proposition,” she told him, shaking her head.

  “What can I tell you? It’s a gift.” Hunter glanced over toward the laptop that Valri had unlocked for them. “Want me to troll through the sites that Kurtz visited?”

  “See if he has a profile on the Second Time Around website,” she said.

  “Think he used his own name?”

  “He probably wasn’t creative enough to come up with anything on his own. Just doing this was a big step for him. He probably didn’t even think that there were people who made things up to put down in their profiles.” She paused for a moment, then decided to ask Brannigan the question that occurred to her. “You ever go to one of these sites?”

  “Nope. I like face-to-face better,” he said honestly. “That way you know if you have any chemistry. You can’t experience chemistry through a website.”

  “Some people do,” she pointed out.

  Actually, she thought, more than a few, considering the stories that she had heard over the last few years. The idea of filling out a form online in order to meet her perfect soul mate never even remotely appealed to Kenzie. People could lie on the internet just as easily as they could lie in person.