Читать книгу Grave Accusations - Paul Dunn - Страница 7

Prologue

“I’m filing battery charges against you today.”

Monica Dunn looked out the window, her perfect face hidden from her husband. Such a simple word, battery. But it could end a police officer’s career. Even one with a fifteen year record of dedication and honesty.

“What in the world are you talking about?” Paul Dunn asked, trying to hear over the resounding crunch of cereal and laughter from their four-year-old and five-year-old daughters in the nearby kitchen. Monica continued to stare out at the street as the sun glinted off her shiny, dark curls. Her carefully made-up brown eyes and delicate cheekbones radiated an energy of their own. She didn’t answer her husband. She didn’t even flash those sparkling, bedroom eyes at him.

Her back to Paul, Monica’s silence seemed to grow deafening. She finally whirled around and spoke. “Look at me. I’m bruised all over.”

She stood there only moments then strode past him toward what had been the bedroom they shared for so long before their separation two weeks ago. Now he didn’t belong. Stunned, Paul watched her hips swivel in the fitted, deep purple dress that clung to her breasts and tiny waist, snugly fitting around those luscious hips. The button-down dress accentuated every curve. Her legs swirled endlessly in high-heeled, spiked pumps. Paul remembered those pantyhose-clad legs wrapped around him during moments of abandon.

“Are you kidding? You know I never hit you,” responded Paul, his blue eyes darkening as he marched down the hall after the vision in purple.

“What are you saying, Monica?” Paul called out, desperation in every syllable. Anxiety and panic spun around in the thirty-five-year-old police officer’s head and turned his thoughts to confusion. He was answered only by a sharp click. She’s locking the bedroom door, Paul thought.

“Monica! Please let me in. We have to talk,” Paul pleaded. When there was no reply, he pounded on the door, muscles bulging underneath his sport shirt. “Please, Monica. What are you trying to do to me?” The sound of his pounding heart drowned out all other thoughts.

“You miserable bastard!”

Anger seared the air. Her words—then silence. Even in his numb state, he knew he had to do something fast. “Monica! Let me in, damn it!”

He heard a click a few seconds later. Her husky voice called out.

“Come here.”

Paul opened the door. A glance showed him the waterbed with its maroon quilt and oak headboard—and Monica. Then he saw the shotgun. He knew it was loaded, because guns were always loaded in his house. He had told Monica to keep them that way. Invoking the code of the old west, some of those he arrested became violent and threatened to pay him or his family back.

A second became a lifetime as a nightmare followed in slow motion. The shotgun, the blast, buttons exploding, blood spurting on the quilt, onto the purple dress. Monica’s body flew backwards, skimming the air like a swan then crash-landing, blood spilling onto the floor. This can’t be happening, he thought. But it was. Monica’s blood flowed from her body.

A scream echoed. It took a moment for Paul to realize it came from his own throat. He ran to the unconscious Monica and tried to lift her, but she was covered in blood and slipped from his hands. She gasped weakly, the only sign of life he saw or heard. But her body’s feeble attempts at living couldn’t bring Monica back to the instant before the shotgun blast violated the body men once would have sold their souls to possess.