Cavanaugh Vanguard

“Cohen just said to get my butt out here,” Jackson answered. “Look, I’m with major crimes,” he pointed out even though he knew that she knew that. “And while this is all pretty gruesome, I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing here.” He looked at Brianna. “Way I see it, since you’re with homicide, this case is right up your alley.”

“You’ve been with the police department for how long now?” she asked him, her voice almost mild and deceptively conversational.

He didn’t see what that had to do with anything, but he answered her. “Going on six years now.”

“Six years,” she repeated, as if she was rolling the information over in her head. “Don’t take much of an interest in the city’s history, do you?”

Jackson looked at the woman. Like so many other members of the police department he had run into, she was part of the Cavanaugh family, a legend throughout the precinct. Cavanaughs, he’d found, set the bar high, each and every one of them.

“Not particularly,” he answered. “Why?”

“Well, if you did know a little of the city’s history,” she told him, “you’d know that initially this was all farmland that belonged to one family. The Aurora family.”

“All right,” he allowed, still waiting to hear where she was going with all this.

Out of the corner of her eye, Brianna saw the ME, Kristin Alberghetti-Cavanaugh, wheeling another one of the newly unearthed victims out of the hotel. She stepped to one side, never missing a beat of the story she was telling Jackson.

“George Aurora was the original patriarch of the family. He started taking the money the family made selling their crops and investing it. The investments were solid, so he decided to use some of the profits to build a small town, which he named after himself.

“Everything in and around Aurora belonged to the Aurora family. Including the Aurora Hotel,” she pointed out, adding, “which, it turns out, Winston Aurora, George’s oldest grandson, recently sold to the city so that Aurora could continue to expand.”

“Winston’s the one who throws all those fund-raisers, raising money to build that new children’s hospital and new schools for the city, right?” Jackson said, recalling things that he’d heard.

“One and the same,” Brianna confirmed. “No one wants to risk getting on the wrong side of the man or his two brothers if they don’t have to, so I’m told that major crimes was called in to treat this whole thing—and the Aurora family—with kid gloves.”

The strained smile on her face as she concluded told Jackson just what she thought of that idea, seeing as how he was the one the major crimes lieutenant had chosen to represent the division.

Jackson read between the lines. “Are you saying you think Mr. Fund-Raiser is responsible for the dead bodies?”

“I’m saying we’re supposed to look at everyone else first before we even so much as think of pointing a finger at him or anyone else in his family. Having major crimes join homicide in the investigation is supposed to be the police department’s way of being thorough,” Brianna told him. “That means crossing every single t and dotting every single i. And if I recall correctly from the last couple of times you and I worked together, you are not exactly known as Mr. Diplomacy, so maybe I should be the one to talk to the Auroras.”

“Are we going to be questioning the Auroras first?” Jackson asked.

“No, not in the way you mean,” Brianna answered, thinking he was referring to interrogating the family. “We’re just going to inform them of what the construction crew discovered when they started knocking down the walls.”

Brianna paused for a moment. She’d been told more than once that she had a habit of taking over and leaping into the heart of things before others around her had a chance to digest what was happening. Since she and Muldare were going to be working together on this, she knew she had to do her best not to come on as strong as she had a tendency to. “Unless you have a different idea on the matter,” she added tactfully.

Jackson lifted his wide shoulders then let them fall again in a careless shrug. “My only thought is that maybe we should hold off talking to Mr. Fund-Raiser or anyone in his family until we have a final body count.”

She supposed that Jackson did have a point, but there was a problem with this idea. She glanced over toward where Sean and his team were working.

“I’m not sure how long that would take,” she said honestly. “The building only has three stories, but it’s unusually wide. Consequently, there are a lot of walls to take into account.”

“You really think there are more bodies in them?” Jackson questioned.

She wouldn’t have thought that there were any bodies in the walls, but that certainly hadn’t turned out to be the case.

“You think there aren’t?” Brianna countered.

“Sounds a little unbelievable, don’t you think?” Jackson asked, getting out of the way as another gurney with a body bag was being wheeled out.

“I think finding a single body buried inside a hotel wall is unbelievable, but according to what I’ve been told, they’ve uncovered six,” Brianna answered.

“Seven,” Sean called out.

Brianna and Jackson both turned in the man’s direction.

“Seven?” Brianna asked, stunned.

Sean nodded. “Destiny just told me that the team pulled out another body,” he replied, referring to his top CSI investigator, his son Logan’s wife.

Brianna closed her eyes for a moment, trying to absorb the information and ignore the effect the discovery was having on her stomach.

What kind of a monster had they just stumbled across? And, more important, was that monster still walking among them, or was this the work of someone who had vanished?

Best-case scenario was that the killer was dead. But what if the killer wasn’t dead and hadn’t vanished? What if the killer had just moved his desire to kill to another location?

“You okay?” Jackson asked. He saw his new partner shiver. It definitely wasn’t cold in the room, despite the fact that there was one wall missing.

“I will be,” Brianna answered with zeal. “Once we find the SOB responsible for this.”

Chapter 2

Jackson silently agreed with the detective he had been temporarily partnered with. “Then I guess we’d better get started,” he told Brianna.

Nodding, she turned toward Francisco Del Campo. Transferred to homicide a little over six months ago, the personable detective was still learning the ropes and had no problem taking orders from a woman.

“What would you like me to do?” Del Campo asked.

“Find out exactly when the hotel closed its doors and see if you can get your hands on the hotel’s guest ledger up to that point,” Brianna said. She felt that at least it was a start.

Del Campo furrowed his brow. “How far back do you want to go?”

“Since we don’t know how many bodies are in the walls and how long they’ve been there, why don’t you see how far back you can go,” Jackson told the younger man.

Rather than getting right on it, Del Campo shifted his eyes toward Brianna, waiting for her confirmation. He knew Brianna. He didn’t know Jackson.

She nodded. “What he said,” she told Del Campo, hoping that, at least for the time being, they could all work harmoniously. “I also want you to get all the construction workers’ names. We’ll need to question them if they saw anything unusual. Right now, we don’t know where those bodies came from or who put them there.”

“You got it.” Del Campo was already on his way out of the partially gutted dining room.

The moment Del Campo left, Jackson turned toward the woman on his left. “You know, this is going to go a lot easier if I don’t need your stamp of approval every time I say something.”

Brianna smiled at the major crimes detective. “I was just thinking the same thing.”

Jackson pressed his lips together and kept his comment to himself.

They made their way out of the hotel, weaving around various members of the police department and crime scene investigators. Once outside, Brianna paused for a moment and took a deep breath.

The air smelled sweeter away from the combined odors of death and dust. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Jackson looking at her. “You want to drive?” she asked as she started to walk again.

“You don’t want to arm wrestle for it?” he asked, feigning surprise.

“Normally I’d consider it,” she deadpanned. “But Del Campo and I came here together, and he’s going to need a way to get back to the precinct.”

“So I get to do the honors by default, is that it?” Jackson guessed.

She’d started walking toward where she assumed Jackson had left his unmarked vehicle but she stopped now. The man definitely had a chip on his shoulder. She didn’t remember him being this way the last time they’d worked together.

“Look, if you’re going to want to debate every single move, this case is going to go a lot slower than either one of us—or the chief of Ds—is going to be happy about,” she told him. And then, getting into the car, she got down to the real question. “Do you have a problem working with me this time, Muldare?”

She wasn’t the one responsible for his mood. That had been set in motion before he’d got the call to come out here. Jackson knew he shouldn’t be taking it out on her or subjecting her to any fallout.

“No,” Jackson answered. And then he tagged on a word he hoped would cover the situation. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Brianna said. “Just don’t do it.” And then she got down to the business at hand. “If we’re going to be delivering bad news to one of Aurora’s three leading citizens, we need to present a united front. Otherwise Winston Aurora might get the idea we’re accusing him of being responsible for these bodies.”

“What if he is?” Jackson asked.

That was a giant leap, but it still could be true, she thought.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it—and brace ourselves for all hell breaking loose just for asking.” She glanced at him as she buckled up. “What are your thoughts on this?”

Jackson shrugged, buckling up himself. “Don’t have any.”

“None?” she questioned incredulously. That didn’t seem possible—or logical.

“Nope,” he said as casually as if he was deciding how many eggs he wanted for breakfast. “That might taint my view of the case and interfere with the way I investigate it.”

Listening to him, Brianna could only shake her head. “You are a strange bird, Jackson Muldare.”

He laughed drily. “So I’ve been told.”

“Why aren’t you starting the car?” she asked.

“Because you haven’t told me where we’ll find this guy,” Jackson answered. “Where do you want to go?”

She’d forgotten about that. “We’ll start at Winston Aurora’s home. If he’s attending some board meeting or some other business-related activity, his wife or someone at the house should be able to tell us where he is.” She looked at Jackson expectantly. “You do know where Winston Aurora lives, right?”

Jackson didn’t answer her. Instead, he started up the white sedan and pulled out of the parking lot.

The lot was still crowded with vehicles belonging to the officers who had responded to the call, as well as those of the construction workers who had been told to stop work on the demolition immediately. Del Campo was still taking down the latter group’s names, Brianna noted, seeing the detective talking to a group of hard hats.

“Oh damn,” Brianna said.

“Is that a general, all-inclusive ‘oh damn,’ or are you referring to something specific?” Jackson asked, keeping his eyes on the road.

Brianna twisted around in her seat, peering out the rear window. There was a news van pulling up toward the cluster of police cars.

“That’s a ‘make sure that news van doesn’t suddenly decide to follow you’ oh damn,” she answered. She twisted forward again. “The last thing we need or want is someone from the Fourth Estate thinking we’re going to be talking to Winston Aurora or anyone in his family.”

“But we are,” Jackson answered matter-of-factly.

She wondered if he was putting her on or if he just viewed situations in a linear fashion. For the sake of argument, she explained it to him.

“We want to keep a lid on this and control the story for as long as we can until we know if there is a story involving the Auroras.”

“We already know there are bodies,” Jackson pointed out.

“Yes, but what we don’t know is if the Auroras’ connection ends with the fact that the hotel was built by their grandfather and bears their name—or if one of them is more involved than that,” she told Jackson. “If the media gets hold of this before we’re ready, there’ll be so much speculation going on, we won’t be able to do our jobs properly.”

Jackson said nothing.

She found it annoying and felt as if she was talking to herself.

Suddenly, the detective deviated from the road he was on. The next moment he was pulling his vehicle into a drive-through lane threading around a fast-food restaurant called Sloppy Joes.

“What are you doing?” Brianna demanded.

Jackson spared her a quick glance before inching the car forward. They were behind a Hummer 3 that was just barely keeping between the lines.

“Making sure that news van doesn’t think we’re onto something and follow us—haven’t you been paying attention to what you just said?” he asked innocently.

For a split second, she wanted to punch him, but she refrained, thinking she’d do more damage to her fist than to his really muscular shoulder.

Instead, Brianna laughed. “I forgot.” As she recalled, Muldare had an unorthodox method of operation. “You take some getting used to.”

Jackson made no comment on her observation. “Since we’re here, you want to get something?”

Food was the last thing on her mind. Brianna twisted around in her seat again. There was no sign of the news van. It hadn’t followed them after all.

Sitting forward again, she told Jackson, “Coffee, black.”

His expression remained stoic. “That stuff’ll rot out your gut,” he told her.

Unfazed by the image that created, Brianna said, “Haven’t you heard? Coffee is supposed to help keep dementia at bay.”

“That’s this week’s theory,” he said, unimpressed. “Next week they’ll rescind that theory and replace it with something else.”

Brianna shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. I like coffee. It keeps me going.”

“Those are called nerves,” he told her as he placed the order—coffee for her, nothing for him—then pulled to the next window.

“Anyone ever tell you that you can be a real downer?” Brianna asked as she took out a five-dollar bill to hand him.

Eyes forward, Jackson waved away her money. “Yeah, you,” he answered. “The last time we worked together, as I recall.”

“Well, I guess nothing’s changed,” she told him. She waited as Jackson paid the woman at the drive-through window for the coffee and then handed the covered container to her.

“Not a real fan of change,” Jackson answered matter-of-factly as he drove away from the fast-food restaurant.

She could believe that, Brianna thought, but she kept that to herself.

Holding the container in both hands, Brianna looked around in all directions. There was no sign of the news van anywhere. “Looks like you lost them.”

“That was the intention,” he answered matter-of-factly.

Brianna took a long sip of her coffee, then put the lid back on. “Still the sparkling conversationalist, I see.”

Jackson glanced in her direction, then looked forward again. “Sparkling conversation was not a prerequisite for graduating from the academy.”

Brianna studied his profile for a long moment. “Maybe it should have been,” she said. “By the way, thanks for the coffee.” She raised the container to her lips again.

“Don’t mention it,” Jackson told her. “I’m serious,” he added before she could respond in any way. “Don’t mention it.”

Brianna sighed. This was going to be a really long, long investigation.

* * *

The road leading to Winston Aurora’s forty-thousand-square-foot mansion—by no stretch of the imagination could the structure be referred to as a mere house—was scenic, long and winding. Exceedingly winding.

“Doesn’t this road ever end?” Jackson muttered under his breath.

“Doesn’t feel that way, does it?” Brianna agreed. “Maybe they want you to feel like you got lost so you’ll just finally give up and turn around,” she guessed. “But if that is the thinking on their part, they forgot to take one important thing into account.”

Silence hung between them until Jackson finally asked, “And that is...?”

She offered him a self-satisfied smile. “We don’t give up.”

“We?” he deliberately questioned. He wasn’t accustomed to “we.” For as long as he could remember, he’d thought of himself as a loner, not as someone who was part of something for more than a few moments at a time.

“The police department,” Brianna told him with a touch of impatience in her voice. Was he deliberately making things difficult? “Work with me here, Muldare.”

“Doing my best,” Jackson replied in a voice that couldn’t have sounded more disinterested if he’d intentionally tried.

She gave him a penetrating look that would have made any other man squirm. “No, you’re not,” Brianna countered.

Without a word in his own defense, Jackson spared her a quick glance before looking back at the road.

The path to the mansion was growing progressively narrower. Jackson half expected to see mountain goats dotting the area any second now. He hadn’t thought that any part of Aurora was still this pastoral looking.

“Is this where I’m supposed to argue with you?” he asked. “Because if it is, you’re going to have to let me in on the game plan, O’Bannon. I’m not much on picking up subtle cues.”

That was for sure, Brianna thought. Out loud she said, “The plan is for you to get your head back in the game and pay attention.”

A dark expression came over his face. “I thought that was what I was doing.”

She shifted in her seat. The hell it was. She only had half his attention, if that much. As far as Brianna could see, there was only one explanation for something like that.

“You don’t want to be here, do you?” she asked point-blank.

“Going to talk to some rich guy who thinks because he has enough money to buy a city, that means he’s above the rules?” Jackson guessed. “No, not particularly.”

“Okay,” Brianna allowed. “Then what would you rather be doing?”

That was easy enough to answer. “Identifying the victims. Finding out how they became victims and then tracking down the person who made them victims.”

Jackson braced himself for an argument. He knew that his mode of operation and his view on things were never the kind to win him popularity contests. But he wasn’t in this for popularity. He was here to act on behalf of the victims. To take their side and, whenever possible, to avenge their deaths.

He was surprised when O’Bannon didn’t attempt to take him apart.

“All very good goals,” Brianna told him, and she genuinely seemed to mean it. “But in order to reach any of those goals, we have to start at the beginning, and the beginning, in this case, is to notify the man who was the last owner of the property of exactly what was found on his property. Who knows? He might say something that will point us in the right direction to find the killer or killers.”

Although he appreciated that she didn’t attempt to belittle his viewpoint, he couldn’t bring himself to agree with what she’d just said.

He laughed harshly. “You really believe that?”

Brianna regrouped. She did her best not to take offense. That would be petty, and she’d been taught to rise above pettiness. Especially when the stakes were high, as they were here.

“I believe in a lot of things you probably don’t,” she answered.

“Well, it probably doesn’t matter what you believe, because I don’t think we’re ever going to get to this guy’s house,” Jackson retorted. The road continued to wind and weave before him like a serpentine river, irritating him no end.

“Oh ye of little faith,” Brianna scoffed, irritating him even more. “Look,” she said, pointing in the distance. “There. Straight ahead,” she told Jackson, then amended, “Well, maybe not so straight, but it’s right there, up ahead of us.”

One more twist of the road and then he saw it—a mansion that looked as if it had its own zip code.

“I’ve seen cities that were smaller,” Jackson commented under his breath.

Brianna heard him nonetheless. “If I lived here, I’d need a ton of bread crumbs,” she said. “Better yet, my own tram.”

He thought of the tiny room where his father spent his days and nights. Part of the time, Ethan Muldare was oblivious to not only how small his surroundings were, but where they were as well.

“Who needs this much room?” Jackson muttered as he pulled up into the circular driveway.

It was a rhetorical question, but Brianna answered him anyway. “Apparently, Winston Aurora and his family.” She had just got out on her side when she saw a young man dressed in what could have passed as valet livery hurrying up to them.

“May I help you?” the man asked in a crisp voice that was far from welcoming.

“We’re here to see Mr. Aurora,” Brianna said, answering for both of them. “Winston Aurora.”

The man’s eyes washed over them disdainfully. “Do you have an appointment?” His tone indicated that he was certain they didn’t.

Jackson took out his badge and ID, holding both aloft. Less than half a beat behind him, Brianna displayed hers.

“We do now,” Jackson informed the man he took to be the mansion’s head of security.

The man looked at each badge and ID individually. Then, appearing annoyed, he nodded. “Wait right here,” he told them curtly.

Turning away, he took out a walkie-talkie and spoke into it in a hushed voice. The unit gave off a loud, piercing squawk, and then a deep voice ordered, “Send them in, Rollins.”

Chapter 3

Leaning in toward Jackson, Brianna said in a hushed voice, “Looks like we get to see the wizard after all, Toto.”

Jackson frowned. “Toto was a dog.”

Brianna merely smiled. “He followed Dorothy wherever she went,” she replied, as if, in her opinion, that was enough of a reason for the nickname.

The man who had detained them was back. “Mr. Aurora will see you.”

“Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,” Brianna murmured under her breath.

Eyes like highly polished small black marbles narrowed as the head of the estate security looked at her. “Excuse me?”

She was aware that Muldare had taken a single step in front of her, putting himself between her and the powerful-looking head of security.

“Nothing. Please lead the way to Mr. Aurora,” Brianna requested, gesturing ahead of the man.

Rollins muttered something unintelligible under his breath as he turned away from them and began to walk toward the mansion.

“That was very noble of you,” Brianna whispered to Jackson, looking up at him, a smile flickering over her lips. “Unnecessary, but noble.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jackson responded in an unemotional voice. The expression on his face was completely unreadable.

The hell he didn’t. Under that dour demeanor, the man was a Boy Scout, Brianna thought. She vaguely remembered that from last time.

“I can take care of myself,” Brianna reminded him.

“Never questioned it for a moment,” Jackson replied in the same nondescript tone.

How could a man be so annoying and yet so intriguing at the same time, Brianna asked herself. But there was no question in her mind that Jackson was both.

You don’t have time for this. You’ve got bigger things on your agenda right now, remember? Brianna reminded herself as she and Jackson walked behind the estate’s head of security and into Winston Aurora’s residence.