CHAPTER TWO
JES
Present day, in a small town outside of Chicago
Jessica Kincaid stared at the pictures strewn across her desk where she’d searched for clues for the past three hours. She’d tracked the monster who committed these murders for several years now, but even with the hours she’d poured into his brutal crime—it remained her one unsolved case.
Whenever she felt deadlocked on an investigation, as she did now, she went back to this one. This one was personal. This one left her alone as a child. The bodies in such slayings told their story to someone who listened—and Jes learned to listen. She came to know the passion, the hate, the sadness in their stories. She had to unravel what lay beneath.
Yet no matter how many murders she solved—she couldn’t unravel what was hidden beneath this one. Maybe because she’d always known who killed these kids. What she didn’t know—was why?
Reaching up, she massaged her temples, closing her eyes and leaning back. She dropped her hands onto the arms of her chair, stretching to ease her tired back. That relaxed her too much, and she fought off a yawn. Running a hand through her hair in frustration, she sat forward, looking at the pictures again.
Her partner, Jared, looked up—giving her a hard look from where he sat across from her. Until now, he’d pretty much ignored her, working his own angle.
Jes tried for a neutral expression, keeping her gaze down and fingering the edge of one of the old photos. There, she did her best to pretend he didn’t watch her, focusing all her thoughts on the body of a gang member who’d been shredded by a beast that day, fifteen years before. A day that completely changed her life.
But ignoring Jared didn’t work. It made him curious. Damn. She sighed when he got up, coming around his desk to sit on the corner of her own, looking at one of the pictures, then another. She followed his gaze to the photos.
She’d memorized every detail of them, long ago.
“When are you going to stop trying to solve this old case?” he asked, his brows raised.
She made a face at him. He dared her to deny her obsession, and she knew it. Worse. He was right. She didn’t feel any closer to finding the boy who’d committed these killings then she had the day she’d snuck out of the car to find her father studying the slayings of these gang members.
“Nine gang members,” Jared said, as if reading her thoughts.
She looked at him. “Yep—nine gang members,” she repeated. And a boy she’d thought she loved who disappeared from her life, taking his sisters, his parents—and her own mother and father with him. “I didn’t exactly stumble onto this job by accident,” she said reflexively.
Jared gave her a crooked smile like she said something amusing. “No,” he said, looking back at the old photos on her desk. “I can imagine you didn’t.”
She worked hard to become a detective, and a forensic specialist, but back then, she’d been a kid starting high school, not even knowing what she wanted to be when she grew up.
Her father had picked her up when he received the call to this crime. He’d parked the car where she couldn’t see anything and told her to stay put. But, of course—she hadn’t. She’d been too curious not to sneak out and take a little peek. What she’d seen that afternoon changed the course of her life.
She looked up to find Jared studying her face.
“What is it, Jes?” he asked. “What’s the big secret you never want to share?”
She feigned a smile—gave him the same answer she always did when he got too curious. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
That use to scare him off. At first. The first couple years they worked together, when he’d seen her take on the more bizarre cases. Lately, he’d become less afraid and more curious. Now, it only annoyed him.
Like now.
“How did an animal manage to sneak into the city and kill nine dangerous gang members? Nine armed youths with various dangerous weapons?” he pushed. “Even if that beast was a bear—it was one beast.”
Jes looked away, avoiding the intensity of his gaze. She knew exactly what—or actually—more precisely—who—had done it.
The police were as dumbfounded as Jared, at the kind of creature who managed to kill those boys. Yet, even when all the professionals in the city hadn’t been able to figure out how something that large could have made it that far into the city, without being seen, and killed nine well-known gang members, Jes knew exactly what kind of monster could pull it off.
Jes knew, and she took every class she could, graduating from high school at sixteen, going on to college to study anything, and everything, that might help her find him.
She looked up to find Jared glaring at her, and she met his glare, shaking her head at him. “Trust me, Jared,” she said softly. “You don’t want to know. You never want to know.”
That took him back. She could see it on his face. He looked at the pictures with fresh eyes, and she knew it was only a matter of time. She followed his gaze back to the photos.
She’d never know what compelled her to follow her dad out of the car that cold morning. When she’d seen what her father tried to prevent her from seeing, the image became permanently frozen in her memory bank, as hands over her mouth she’d tried to close her eyes. Yet, horrified, she’d been unable to look away.
Even as a child, Jes was too driven to find answers. This one cost her. After all these years, she still couldn’t get the shock of seeing their bright red blood sprayed across the ground—or the sight of their bodies—torn and mangled—out of her head.
Jared looked at her. “So, you do know what kind of animal did this?” He stood up. His legs spread in a wide-stance that said he expected a fight. “You’ve always known? How could you? No one was able to figure out what happened to those boys that day.”
Jes gave him a sad smile. She knew how sad it must look. She couldn’t help it. “His name was Justice,” she finally said. She shrugged. “Isn’t that funny?” She felt a tear slide down her face, and she snatched it away, hoping he didn’t see it. She saw him frown like she’d told him a joke and didn’t sound like she was out of her mind—before he spotted it.
He went stalk still and without another word, spun around and went back to his desk.
Her cheeks went hot, realizing he’d moved to give her some space. She reached into her box and took out the one photo she always left there—at the bottom of the proverbial box.
She didn’t care how much she loved that boy. That had been the past. She didn’t know how he managed to make everyone she loved disappear that day. She’d never let such things get her down, again. She promised herself she’d figure that out later, when it didn’t hurt so much—when she’d managed to bring Justice in for killing those boys.
What she couldn’t ignore—what she couldn’t afford to ignore—was the fact that these slayings became a brutal reminder of what could happen if something went wrong—inside of her—the same way it had gone wrong inside of him. She’d lived in fear of it—knew she’d never take the possibility for granted—that she, too, could turn into such a monster.
Jes gathered the pictures, throwing them into the box. She’d never for a moment forget what could happen—if the beast inside her were to get that angry—as angry as he must have—to turn him into the monster he’d become that day. That boy she loved so much….
Shaking, Jes got up to pour herself a cup of the foul coffee, which, as usual, had sat too long in a stale, old pot. She made a face as the bitter brew slide past her tongue, and she nearly gagged swallowing it. She headed for the sink, pot in hand, dumping it out to make a new batch.
She had fresh coffee by the time she sat back at her desk, setting her cup down and looking at the small newspaper someone set on her desk. A Thrifty Nickel. She frowned. Why did someone put this thing here? She picked it up, looking around.
No one paid her any mind.
She glanced at Jared, but he’d gone back to pouring over his own case. She nearly dumped the pa
per into the trash when something stopped her. What the heck. She could use a break.
She scanned it for a deal, only half paying attention, trying to hold the paper a sufficient distance away, so she wouldn’t find the stench of the ink so overwhelming. She’d nearly turned the page again when she spotted an unusual ad. She sat up, mouth open, staring at it.
What it said made her look up and scan the office again, wondering who knew enough to leave this paper for her. But no one out of the ordinary was in the office that day.
She looked down, reading it again. When injustice is the way of the day, she read, a little justice could pave the way.
Without taking her eyes off caption, set in bold print, she picked up her phone to put an ad of her own in but set the receiver back down. She wasn’t one for patience. Running an ad would take too long.
She got up, grabbing her jacket off the back of her chair as she went, heading for her Jeep. It didn’t take her long to reach the office that printed this particular weekly paper, and it turned out she knew one of the people who worked there. Well, truthfully, she knew most of the people in this town. It wasn’t that big.
The young man sat, too smitten with her not to give her the info she looked for. He pointed her in the direction of a run-down local tavern, where anyone who answered the ad was directed by the next ad. An old tavern called Second Chances.
A phone call told her the tavern had been around for more than three decades. She winced, again. Had been since he’d first said the name—Second Chances. Something about the name rang familiar. Caused her head to hurt, and her stomach to twist in knots.
Jes didn’t like that feeling. She knew it warned her that she headed for something she wouldn’t like. She’d forgotten much of her youth—like blank pages in her memory, repressing some kind of trauma. She’d gone to years of therapy, trying to sort it all out, but nothing brought back the memories. Now, every time something haunted her, it would put her down for days.
She sat straight, resolutely. Not this time. She didn’t have time for such stuff.
She reached the tavern and went inside the dimly lit interior. Too early in the day for more than a couple customers, the bartender stood polishing the beautiful, wooden bar top. She looked away, glancing around the interior as her eyes adjusted to the dim light. The rest of the tavern looked much like the bar top, built out of beautiful, inlaid wood, with delicate carvings painstakingly engraved. These were not machine made. These were much too old for that. No two were the same.
By this time, she’d completed her appraisal, and her gaze returned to the barkeep who stared back at her. Her head hurt again, but this time it pounded, and she could swear she saw recognition in his—before the shutters went down behind his gaze.
She approached him slowly, arms crossed in front of her, holding the paper under one arm. Nothing about him made her feel in danger. So why did she feel like she wanted to run? She unfolded her arms and laid the paper on the bar top, where she’d circled the ad, for him to see. He picked it up, glanced at it, and tossed it back at her. It hit the well-polished surface and slid toward her, coming to a stop right in front of her. She looked at it and back to find him glaring at her.
Now, what could she have possibly done?
His gaze narrowed on her as he leaned forward on his beefy arms. “What of it?”
She frowned at him. “Who posts it?”
Leaning back, he picked up a glass and a pristine white towel and began polishing it. “Who wants to know?”
She fished in her pocket and produced her badge.
He didn’t even glance at it, only kept polishing the glass. “Why do you want to know?”
She curled her lip in a sneer, irritated. “Answer the question.”
He looked up this time, but only flashed a grin at her before his face went immediately back to a stoic mask. “No.” He set down the glass, adjusted it perfectly in line with the next one and picked another and began polishing.
Jes smiled, pissed. She was really starting to hate this guy. She glanced around. There were some pictures hanging behind the cash register. One of them made the hair on the nape of her neck stand on end.
He glanced up to find her staring at it, and he actually smiled. “Well, now. It looks as if you found your answers after all.” He set that glass perfectly in line with the others. “Or at least one of them,” he finished in low tones. He glanced back up. “Question is. What will you do now?”
What an odd thing to say.
She felt sick—sweaty and nauseated—all at once. She frowned at him. The room started to spin around her giving her a drugged sensation, yet she hadn’t ingested anything in more than two hours.
She needed to get out of here—now.
White knuckled, she growled, “I’ll be back,” with all the strength she could find within herself, surprised to hear her voice come out in more of a snarl. She’d turned and headed for the door, when her keen cat hearing picked up what he’d muttered, and she turned back to stare.
He stood there, quietly polishing another glass.
Holding her arms over her middle, she bent forward, turned and rushed outside. Stumbling to her car, she fumbled for her keys. She hit the fob, hearing the sweet sound of the doors unlock, opened the door and slid inside, sitting there shaking, taking slow easy breaths, trying to calm the uneven tempo of her heart.
She couldn’t believe what she’d heard, what he’d called her. He couldn’t possibly know. How could he? But she could not deny what she’d heard.
He’d called her Jaguar Witch.