The Man Behind the Cop

He nodded. “I’m sure it will be fine. For the most part, we won’t be doing many throws. With only the four sessions, we can’t turn the women into martial artists. We’ll focus more on attitude and on how they can talk their way out of situations.”

She stopped at a door, from behind which he heard voices. She lowered her own. “You are aware that most of these women have already been beaten or raped?”

He held her gaze, surprised that her eyes were brown, although her hair was blond. Was it blond from a bottle? His lightning-quick evaluation concluded no. She was the unusual natural blonde who had warm, chocolate-brown eyes.

“I’ll be careful not to say anything to make the women feel they’ve failed in any way.”

The smile he got was soft and beautiful. “Thank you.” The next moment, she opened the door and gestured for him to precede her into the room.

Heads turned, and Bruce found himself being inspected. Not every woman appeared alarmed, but enough did that Bruce wondered if they’d expected only a woman cop. Ages ranged from late teens to mid fifties or older, their clothing style, from street kid to moneyed chic. But what these women had in common mattered more than their differences.

He was careful to move slowly, to keep his expression pleasant.

Karin Jorgensen introduced him, then stepped back and stood in a near-parade stance, as though to say I’m watching you.

Good. He had his eye on her, too.

Bruce smiled and looked from face to face. “My partner, Molly, asked me to apologize for her. Her sister is in labor, and Molly is her labor coach. She plans to be here next week. Tonight, you get just me.”

He saw some tense shoulders and facial muscles relax, as if the mention of a woman giving birth and another there to hold her hand somehow reassured them. The support of other women was all that was helping some of his audience, he guessed.

“We’ll work on a few self-defense drills toward the end of the session—I don’t want you to get numb sitting and listening to me talk,” he began. “But we’ll focus more on physical self-defense in coming weeks. It’ll be easier for me to demonstrate with my partner’s help. She’s just five feet five inches tall, but she can take me down.” He paused to let them absorb that. He was six foot three and solidly built. If a woman ten inches shorter than him could protect herself against him, even be the aggressor, they were definitely interested.

“Most women I know have been raised to believe the men in their lives will protect them,” he continued. “That’s a man’s role. A woman’s is to let herself be protected. How can women be expected to defend themselves against men? You’re smaller, lighter, finer boned, carry less muscle and are incapable of aggression.” He looked around the circle of perhaps twenty women sitting in chairs pushed against the walls of what he guessed was a large conference room. When the silence had stretched long enough, Bruce noted, “That’s the stereotype. Here’s reality. Throughout nature, mother animals are invariably the fiercest of their kind. Like men, women want to survive. Nature creates all of us with that instinct. You, too, can fight if you have to.”

The quiet was absolute. They were hanging on his every word. They wanted to believe him, with a hunger he understood only by context.

“Do you have disadvantages if you’re attacked by a guy my size?” He ambled around the room, focusing on one woman at a time, doing his best to maintain an unthreatening posture. “Sure. What I’m here to tell you is that you have advantages, too. You’re likely quicker than I am, for one thing. You’ve got a lower center of gravity. Women are famous for their intuition, for their ability to read mood and intentions. Chances are good you can outthink your attacker. And if you’re prepared, you’re going to shock him. He won’t expect you to fight back. He’ll have the surprise of his life.”

Murmurs, surprise of their own, but also a gathering sense of possibility: Maybe he’s right. Maybe I can outwit and outfight a man.

He told them stories of women who’d had an assailant whimpering on the ground by the time they were done.

“The greatest battle you have to fight from here on out,” he went on, “is with your own attitude. What you have to do is liberate yourself from every defeatist voice you’ve ever heard.

“Many of you have already been assaulted.” Heads bobbed, and renewed fear seemed to shiver from woman to woman, as if a whisper had made the rounds. “Then I don’t have to tell you submission doesn’t work.” He waited for more nods, these resigned. “I’m here to tell you aggression might. At worst—” he spread his hands “—you’ll be injured. But you know what? He was going to hurt you anyway.”

Something was coming alive in their faces. They looked at one another, exchanged more nods.

He had them, from the frail Hispanic woman in the corner, to the overweight teenage girl with acne, to the iron-haired woman who could have been his mother had Mom ever had the courage to seek the means to defend herself.

And, he saw, he had pleased Karin Jorgensen, who at last abandoned her military stance by the door and took a seat, prepared to listen and learn, herself.

He didn’t let her sit for long, asking her to help him demonstrate. As he showed how an attacker opened himself up the minute he reached out to fumble with clothing or lift a hand to strike, Bruce was pleased by tiny signs that Karin was as aware of him physically as he was of her. Nothing that would catch anyone else’s attention—just a quiver of her hand, a touch of warmth in her cheeks, a shyness in her gaze—all were a contrast to the confident woman who’d opened the door to him, prepared to face him down if he’d been anyone but the cop she expected.

She smelled good, he noticed when he grabbed her, although the scent was subtle. Tangy, like lemon. Maybe just a shampoo. Lemon seemed right for her sunstreaked hair.

He wanted to keep her with him, but finally thanked her and said, “Okay, everyone pair up.” Unfortunately, the numbers were odd and she paired herself with an overweight teenager, which left him partnerless.

A fair amount of the next hour and a half was spent with him trying to prepare them to grab their first opportunity to fight back and run. They learned some simple techniques for breaking holds or knocking a weapon from an assailant’s hand.

“Next week,” he said, concluding, “we’ll talk about how to use everyday objects as weapons and shields. Molly will be here to demonstrate more releases, more ways to drop me like a rock.” He smiled. “See you then.”

Several women came up afterward to talk to him. By the time Bruce looked around for Karin, she had disappeared. When he went out into the hall to find her, he realized that some of the women had brought children. A second room had evidently been dedicated to child care. He spotted her in there, holding a toddler and talking to one of the participants. Karin saw him at the same time, and handed the toddler to the mother, then walked over to him.

“I’ll escort you out,” she said. “I appreciate you doing this.”

They started down the hall, her long-legged stride matching his. “I thought it went well,” Bruce commented.

“It was amazing. I saw such…hope.” She said the word oddly, with some puzzlement.

Had he surprised her? Given her job, maybe she didn’t like men much and didn’t think one was capable of inspiring a group of battered women.

Or maybe she’d just been groping for the right word.

He wanted to ask whether she was married or involved, but how could he without making things awkward? And, damn it, he was running out of time—the front door stood just ahead.

“I understand you volunteered for this workshop,” Karin said. “That’s very generous of you.”

They’d reached the door. Opening it for her, he inquired, “Are you making any money for this evening’s work?”

He’d surprised her again. She paused, close enough for him to catch another whiff of citrus scent. For a moment she searched his face, as if trying to understand him. “Well…no. But I do work with these women.”

“I do, too,” he said simply.

She bit her lip. “Oh.”

“’Night, Karin,” someone called, and she retreated from him, going outside to exchange good-nights with women on their way to their cars.

Maybe just as well, he tried to convince himself as he, too, exited the building. He’d ask around about her. They inhabited a small world, and someone would know whether she was off limits. If nothing else, he’d see her next week.

“Good night,” he said, nodding. He’d finally snagged her attention.

“Thank you again,” she replied.

Their eyes met and held for a moment that seemed to bring color to her cheeks. Wishful thinking, maybe. He turned away. Even with his back to Karin, he was aware of her speaking to others in the parking lot. The voices, he was glad to hear, were animated.

He kept going, enjoying the cool air and the way the scent of the lilacs was sharper after dark. He liked the night and the sense he had of being invisible. He could see people moving around inside their houses or the flicker of televisions through front windows, but by now not a single car passed him on the street.

He reached his car, now sandwiched between an SUV and a VW Beetle. Not much room to maneuver. He’d be inching out.

His key was in his hand, but he hadn’t yet inserted it in the door, when he heard the first terrified scream.

CHAPTER TWO

IT HAPPENED SO FAST.

The parking lot had emptied quickly. Only a van from one of the battered women’s shelters remained, the director half sitting on the bumper as she awaited her charge. Satisfied with how the evening had gone, Karin was walking back toward the front door of the clinic when, out of the corner of her eye, she caught movement under a streetlight. She turned to see a dark figure rush toward the lone woman halfway between the building and the van. Oh, God. It was Lenora Escobar. She’d just said good-night to Karin.

“Roberto!”

The distinctly uttered name struck terror in Karin.

His arm lifted. He held a weapon of some kind. Lenora screamed.

The weapon smashed down followed by an indescribably horrible sound. Like a pumpkin being dropped, squishing. Lenora gurgled, then crumpled.

The arm rose and fell a second time, and then Roberto Escobar ran.

During the whole event, Karin hadn’t managed two steps forward.

As though time became real once more, Karin and Cecilia, the shelter director, converged on the fallen woman. Karin focused only on her, ignoring the squealing tires from the street.

Should I have run after him? Tried to make out a license-plate number?

But no. There could be no doubt that Lenora’s assailant—not her murderer, please not her murderer—was her husband. His vehicle and license-plate number would be on record.

Thank God, Karin thought, dropping to her knees, that Lenora hadn’t brought her children tonight. He would have taken them if she had.

Lenora’s head lay in a pool of blood. A few feet away was a tire iron. Karin’s stomach lurched. Fingerprints…Had Roberto worn gloves? No. He didn’t care who knew that he’d killed his wife for the sin of leaving him.

“Cecilia, go back inside and call 911. Or do you have a cell phone?” She sounded almost calm. “Unless…wait.” She heard pounding footsteps and swiveled on her heels. “Detective Walker,” she said with profound relief—relief she felt not just because he was a cop and he was here, but because tonight this particular cop had managed to reassure and inspire a roomful of women who had every reason to be afraid of men.

He was running across the parking lot, holding a cell phone in his hand. Then he was crouching beside her. He spoke urgently into the phone, giving numbers she guessed were code for Battered Wife Down.

He touched Lenora’s neck and looked up. “She’s alive.”

Karin sagged. “Can’t we do anything?”

He shook his head. “We don’t want to move her. The ambulance is on its way.” His gaze, razor sharp, rested on Karin’s face. “Did you see what happened?”

“Yes.” To Karin’s embarrassment, her voice squeaked. So much for calm. She cleared her throat. “It was her husband. She said the name Roberto. She just left him.”

“She and her children are staying at the shelter,” Cecilia added. “She didn’t tell him she was leaving him. I don’t know how he found her.”

“He had to have followed her tonight.” The detective was thinking aloud. “Where are the children? He didn’t get them?”

Cecilia was a dumpy, endlessly comforting woman likely in her fifties. Detective Walker hadn’t even finished his question before she shook her head. “Lenora’s aunt picked them up and took them home for the night. She’s to bring them back in the morning.”

Karin’s heart chilled at his expression. “You don’t think…?” Oh, God. If he had the aunt’s house staked out…

She’d warned Lenora. “Stay away from friends and family,” she’d said.

Focused on Cecilia, Detective Walker asked, “Do you know the woman’s name?”

“Yes…um, Lopez. Señora Lopez.”

Aunt…Karin groped in her memory. Aunt…“Julia.”

“Yes.” Cecilia flashed her a grateful look. “Julia Lopez. I have her phone number back at the shelter.”

“Call.” He held out his cell phone. “We need to send a unit over there. She should know about her niece, anyway.”

“Yes. Of course.” Cecilia fumbled with the phone but finally dialed.

Karin didn’t listen. She stared helplessly at Lenora, who had been so triumphant Friday afternoon because she’d successfully made her getaway. “He never guessed anything,” she’d told Karin in amazement. “He gave me money Thursday after he deposited his check. He was even in a good mood.”

Now, gazing at Lenora’s slack face and blood-matted hair, Karin could only say, “He followed her aunt to the shelter tonight, didn’t he?”

At the first wail of a siren, Karin’s head came up. She prayed fervently, Let it be the ambulance for Lenora.

A second siren played a chorus. Two vehicles arrived in a rush. A Seattle PD car first, flying into the parking lot, then the ambulance, coming from the opposite direction.

The EMTs took over. As Karin stood and backed away to give them room to work, her legs trembled as though she’d run a marathon. And not just her legs. She was shaking all over, she realized. For all the stories she’d heard from brutalized women, she’d never witnessed a rape scene or murder or beating. The experience was quite different in real life.

Cecilia came to her and they hugged, then clung. Karin realized her face was wet with tears.

Bruce Walker was busy issuing orders to two uniformed officers. Their voices were low and urgent; beyond them, in the squad car, the radio crackled.

“We should wait inside,” Karin said at last. She needed to sit. “He’ll probably want to ask us both some more questions.”

Cecilia drew a shuddering breath. “Yes. You’re right.”

Karin glanced back, to find that Detective Walker was watching them. He gave her a nod, which she interpreted as approval. His air of command was enormously comforting.

Thank God he’d still been within earshot. Imagine how much harder this would be had she been dealing with strangers now, instead.

The gurney vanished into the guts of the aid car, one of the EMTs with it. The other EMT slammed the back doors and raced to the driver’s side of the vehicle. They were moving so fast, not wasting a motion. Then once again the siren wailed, and the ambulance roared down the street.

She couldn’t stop herself from looking again at the blood slick, dark under the streetlight, and at the tire iron, flung like some obscene kind of cross on the pavement. Then the two women walked into the building, still holding hands.

HE CAME IN sooner than she expected, thank goodness.

Through the glass doors, both women were aware of the blinding white flashes as a photographer worked, a counterpoint to the blue-and-white lights from the squad car. Why don’t they turn them off? Karin wondered, anger sparking. What good did they do?

Once inside, the detective walked straight to them and sank into a chair beside Karin. Turning his body so that he was facing them, he was so close to Karin his knee bumped hers and she could see the bristles on his jaw. Like most dark-haired men, he must need to shave twice a day to keep a smooth jaw. But then, this day had been longer than he could ever have anticipated.

Karin gave her head a shake. Did it matter how well groomed he was? No. Yet she couldn’t seem to discipline her thoughts. She wanted to think about something, anything, but that awful smash-squish and the sight of Lenora collapsing. Karin had never seen anyone fall like that, with no attempt to regain footing or fling out arms to break the impact. As if Lenora had already been dead, and it didn’t matter how she hit.

Detective Walker pulled a small notebook and pen from a pocket inside his leather jacket. With a few succinct questions, he extracted a bald description of events from Cecilia, then Karin.

“Thank the Lord the other women had gone,” Cecilia said with a sigh.

“Amen,” Karin breathed. Imagine if Olivia, recently raped and still emotionally fragile, had witnessed the brutal assault.

The shelter director asked, “Have you heard anything about the aunt?”

“Not yet.”

Was he worried? Karin scrutinized his face. She couldn’t be sure—she didn’t know him—but thought she saw tiny signs of tension beside his eyes, in muscles bunched in his jaw, in the way he reached up and squeezed his neck, grimacing.

“This was a bad idea,” Karin exclaimed. “To bring all these women here like…like sitting ducks! What was I thinking?”

He laid his hand over hers. “No, it was a good idea,” he reassured her quietly, those intense eyes refusing to let her look away from him. “Once Roberto knew where his wife was, it was a done deal.”

“It’s true,” Cecilia assured her. “Don’t you remember? Just last year, Janine’s boyfriend was waiting outside the shelter for her. He shot her, then himself, right there on the sidewalk. It was—” She stopped, sinking her teeth into her lip. “This could just as easily have happened at the shelter. Lenora had to go out eventually.”

Karin deliberately relaxed her hands, and he removed his. What was she doing, thinking about herself now? Her guilt could wait. Right now the children mattered; Lenora mattered. Karin was wasting this man’s time making him console her, when he should be doing something to catch Roberto.

“Do you know which hospital they took Lenora to?” she asked.

“Harborview. It’s tops for trauma.” His cell phone rang. “Excuse me.”

He stood and walked away, but not outside. Although his back was to them, Karin heard his sharp expletive. Her hand groped Cecilia’s.

Still talking, he faced them. His eyes sought out Karin’s, and she saw anger in them. It chilled her, and she gripped the director’s hand more tightly. He listened, talked and listened some more, never looking away from her.

Finally he ended the call and came back to them. Karin wasn’t sure she’d even blinked. She couldn’t tear her gaze from this man’s.

He dropped into the chair as if exhausted. “He’s already been there. The aunt’s dead. A neighbor says the uncle works a night shift. We’ll be tracking him down next. The kids are gone.”

“Oh, no,” Karin breathed, although his expression had told her what happened before he’d said a word. Cecilia exclaimed, too.

“I’m heading over there. I’m Homicide. This case—” his voice hardened “—I’m taking personally.”

“The children…” Horror seized Karin by the throat. “Does that mean they were in the car? Did they see him attack their mother?”

Detective Walker’s mouth twisted. “We don’t know yet. He had a headstart. He could have gotten there, killed the aunt and snatched the kids after leaving here.”

She heard the doubt in his voice. “But…?”

“The officers who found her haven’t found a weapon. She was battered in the head. She could be lying on it, or it might be tossed under a bush in the front yard.”

Something very close to a sob escaped Karin. “But he might have used the same tire iron.”

“Possibly.”

“I pray they didn’t see,” Cecilia whispered. “Enrico and Anna are the nicest, best-behaved children. Their faces shone for their mother.”

“Have…have you heard anything?” Karin asked. “About Lenora?”

“Nothing.” His hand lifted, as if he intended to touch her again, and then his fingers curled into a fist and he stood. Expression heavy with pity, he said, “There’s no need for you to stay.”

“I’m going to the hospital.” Karin rose to her feet, too, galvanized now by purpose, however little hovering in a hospital waiting room really served. She couldn’t save Lenora, but somebody should be there, and who else was there until family was located?

Cecilia nodded, rising, as well. “I have to go back to the shelter first and talk to the residents. I don’t want them to hear about this from anyone else. I asked staff to wait. I’ll join you as soon as I can, Karin.”

“Thank you.” Karin squeezed Cecilia’s hand one more time, then released it. She turned to the detective. “You’ll let us know?”

He nodded. “Do you have a cell phone?”

She told him her number and watched him write it down in his small, spiral notebook. And then he inclined his head, said, “Ladies,” and left.

Neither woman moved for a minute, both watching through the glass as he crossed the parking lot, spoke to officers still out there, then disappeared into the darkness.

“He’s…impressive,” Cecilia said at last.

“Yes.” Thank goodness Cecilia had no way of knowing how attracted she’d been to him from the moment she’d let him into the clinic. Embarrassed, she cleared her throat. “I hope…” She didn’t finish the thought.

Didn’t have to. Cecilia nodded and sighed. “What’s to become of those poor children?”

“Lenora has a sister in this country. She has children, too. I’m not sure whether they’re in the Seattle area.” Once they talked to Lenora’s uncle, he’d make calls.

Karin shut off lights and locked up. Activity in the parking lot had slowed and the tire iron had apparently been bagged and removed, but a uniformed officer asked that they exit carefully, pulling out so as not to drive over the crime scene. Somebody, Karin saw, was vacuuming around the bloodstain. Trace evidence could make or break a case, she knew, but how would they be able to sift out anything meaningful from the normal debris?

Following her gaze, Cecilia murmured, “What a terrible night,” and got into her van.

Karin hit the locks once she was in her car, inserted the key and started the engine, then began to shake again. She was shocked at her reaction. She’d always tended to stay levelheaded in minor emergencies, whereas other people panicked. Minor, she thought wryly, was the operative word. Bruce Walker had been angry, but utterly controlled, while here she was, falling apart.

She sat in the car for easily two minutes, until her hands were steady when she lifted them. Finally, she was able to back out, and followed the police officer’s gestures to reach the street.

At a red light, she checked to make sure her cell phone was on and the battery not exhausted. How long, she wondered, until she heard from Detective Bruce Walker? And why did it seem so important that he not delegate that call?

BRUCE HADN’T TOLD the women that what he most feared was finding Anna and Enrico Escobar dead at their father’s hand, next to his body.

Bruce had gone straight to the Lopez home, but on the way he made the necessary calls to get a warrant to go into the Escobar house. If the son of a bitch had intended to take his whole family out, it seemed logical that he’d have gone home with the kids. He might have feared being stopped in the parking lot before he finished the job.