Читать книгу Cavanaugh Hero - Marie Ferrarella - Страница 8

Prologue

The gunshot was muffled deliberately, the extension on the end of the gun barrel all but silencing the scream of the bullet. A bullet that ended a life in less than a heartbeat.

One minute the inebriated, off-duty police officer on the sofa was looking up with those pathetic, puppy-dog eyes, talking about some little two-bit who had strung him along; the next, he wasn’t talking at all and those puppy-dog eyes weren’t looking at anything anymore.

The cop never knew what hit him, the shooter thought with satisfaction. He certainly hadn’t been expecting it, which was the whole point. The liquor had done its job, lulling the cop into a sense of complacency.

The shooter relished every millisecond of the bullet’s flight upon release. Relished even more the irreversible damage done by that bullet once it buried itself in the intended target’s flesh.

The shooter watched in captivated fascination as the last bit of light—and life—left Sergeant Matthew Holt’s gray eyes.

And within the shooter’s head, the sound of the discharging weapon had roared its presence, declaring its mission to be accomplished.

Justice.

Nothing short of justice had been carried out. A death had been avenged.

Vengeance doesn’t only belong to God, but to me, as well.

“That’ll teach you,” the shooter said, addressing the blue-clad man on the sofa, the man with opened eyes that could no longer see.

The smile widened along the thin lips, a smile that not only represented triumph over what had just happened, but also saw into the future and relished the deaths that were to be.

“Don’t worry,” the shooter said to the dead man who lay sprawled on his once-white sectional sofa. “You’re not going to be alone for long. You’ll have a whole lot of company before I’m through.”

The cold, heartless smile spread even wider in barely contained anticipation. That was all there was left to live for these days.

Anticipation.

And revenge.

“Might even get crowded up there before I’m through.”

The shooter laughed, envisioning the carnage. And then, just as suddenly, the laughter ceased, vanishing as if it had never existed at all.

Sergeant Holt’s executioner took out an eight-by-ten sheet of paper that had carefully cut-out letters pasted on it, pristine letters that didn’t have even a smudge of fingerprints on them, thanks to the disposable plastic gloves on the shooter’s hands. The gloves were as antiseptic as any that were hospital-issued.

Holding the sheet of paper, the shooter bent over the still man, careful not to step in any of the blood that was even now spilling out onto the floor directly below the body, pooling there at a mesmerizing pace.

The paper kept slipping off the body.

“Damn it,” the shooter snapped, swallowing a more ripe curse. The paper was supposed to stay on Holt’s chest. The chest that was no longer moving, no longer drawing breath.

How the hell—?

And then, just like that, there was an answer.

The shooter rose, picked up a stapler off the victim’s desk and returned to the body. Leaning over the man who could no longer feel anything, the shooter stapled the note to his chest.

“Now it won’t slip off,” the shooter announced in triumph, laughing again, the sound a sharp contrast to the still body on the bloodied sectional next to the coffee table.

Dark brown eyes squinted as a mocking expression slipped over the shooter’s face. “Too bad you can’t put this lesson to any use.”

Standing back, the shooter admired the sign stapled to the victim’s chest. In a flurry of uneven, mismatched letters, the note made a chilling promise: “Only the beginning.”

The shooter paused for a few more seconds to admire the scene. There was an intense, overwhelming desire to smash the victim’s face in, but the shooter refrained from acting on it. Nothing could be allowed to mute the force of the message and if the victim’s face was obliterated, the power of the message might be lost. Because Holt was the first offender—but he was definitely not the last. Not by a very long shot.

“You brought this on yourself” were the last words the shooter uttered before quietly slipping out of the house and into the darkness of a moonless night.

The door was left unlocked, inviting discovery. And soon.