Her Second Death (Bree Taggert #0.5)
Melinda Leigh
CHAPTER ONE
Detective Bree Taggert ducked under the yellow crime scene tape and greeted the uniformed cop holding a clipboard. A pair of sawhorses blocked the street. “What’s happening, MacDonald?”
“Corpsicle.” MacDonald wrote Bree’s name and badge number on the crime scene log.
He wasn’t being disrespectful. Cops used gallows humor to cope with the violence and despair they witnessed on a daily basis.
He looked around Bree at the car she’d just exited. “Romano’s your new partner? I hear she’s a hard-ass.”
Bree shoved her hands into the pockets of her wool peacoat. “Better than a dumbass.”
“This is true,” MacDonald agreed.
Bree had been transferred to homicide a couple of days ago and paired with Detective Dana Romano, a twenty-one-year veteran of the Philly PD. Just forty-eight hours into their partnership, Bree would agree that Romano was indeed a hard-ass. Bree felt like she was back in the academy, which was ridiculous. She had plenty of investigative experience, even if that experience was mostly in burglaries and property crimes. But Romano had years of homicide experience. The call they’d responded to the day before had been ruled a suicide. This was their second death investigation as partners, and Bree already knew that Romano was also one of the best. Given a choice between smart and sociable, Bree would take the smart partner any day.
Romano slid out of the Crown Vic and tugged a black knit cap over her short, tousled blonde hair. Long and lean, the forty-six-year-old dressed almost entirely in black—pants, boots, jacket—except for her bright raspberry lipstick. To be fair, Bree also wore mostly black. City road grime was rough on clothes.
Bree stepped off the curb and joined her partner in the center of the street. Her boots were clunky, waterproof with knobby rubber treads. Last week’s snow had melted, leaving an occasional lump of ugly gray snow and random patches of black ice.
Three patrol vehicles were double-parked, lights flashing in front of a brick warehouse that spanned most of the North Philadelphia block. Graffiti covered the rolling overhead doors along the loading dock. Tall chain-link fencing topped with razor wire surrounded a parking lot full of commercial trucks and vans.
Rowhomes on the adjacent block varied from well tended to boarded up. Parked cars lined the streets. Despite the frigid December wind, die-hard weeds sprouted between the concrete slabs and in the cracks of patched blacktop. Bulging black garbage bags had been piled at the curb next to a discarded rusted bicycle frame.
Another uniform gestured toward a vehicle twenty yards away, an old blue Ford Escape with a huge dent in the front fender. “The body’s inside.”
At thirty-one years old, Bree had been with the Philly PD for nine years, first in patrol, then as a detective. She recognized most of the uniforms. “Reilly.”
“Taggert.” He nodded, then greeted her partner. “Hey, Romano, you still dating that lawyer?”
He said lawyer like he meant to say serial killer.
Romano shook her head. “Nope.”
“You should have known you can’t date a lawyer.” Reilly frowned. “Cops and lawyers shouldn’t mix. It ain’t natural.”
“From your lips, Reilly,” Romano said in a knowing voice.
Reilly fell into step beside Bree. “You still dating Ben Harris from the twelfth?”
“What are you, the district matchmaker?” Bree rolled her eyes.
He patted his well-rounded belly. “I just want to see all my fellow officers as fat and happy as I am. Besides, my brother-in-law is in town. The wife wants to fix him up.”
Bree laughed. “Harris and I broke up. The only thing worse than dating a lawyer is seeing another cop.”
“No kidding.” Reilly snorted.
“But I’m not interested in a blind date.” The only male Bree was currently keeping company with was her tomcat. “Too soon.”
Reilly gave Romano a questioning look. “Help a brother out?”
Romano held up a hand. “No fucking way. Not happening.”
They approached the Ford. The driver’s door was open, and a figure slumped over the wheel. “We responded to a call from a passerby who spotted the body.” Reilly motioned toward a man hunched against the cold on the sidewalk. Dreadlocks spilled out from under a black watch cap. “The vehicle doors were unlocked. We opened the door to assess the victim’s condition.” He didn’t need to go on. The victim’s condition was evident.
Bree fastened her top coat button. The dampness cut right through to her bones. Despite MacDonald’s corpsicle reference—and the frigid feel to the wind—overnight temps hadn’t gone below freezing.
Romano leaned over to peer into the vehicle. “Messy.”
Bree looked over her new partner’s shoulder into the Ford. Blood and brains spattered the interior. A bullet had entered the side of the man’s temple. The entry wound was the size of a quarter. The bullet must have tumbled and fragmented inside his skull because it had made a bigger hole on the way out.
Romano stared at the body, her crow’s feet deepening as she assessed the scene.
Bree stepped back and glanced through the rear window into the back seat. The floor was covered in fast-food wrappers, empty kid’s meal boxes, and a couple of discarded sippy cups. A child safety seat was strapped into the middle seat. She tamped down the small punch of emotion. “He’s got a kid.”
Reilly stamped his feet. “The vehicle is registered to James Tyson.”
“Did you run him?” Romano asked Reilly.
“Yeah.” Reilly consulted a notepad. “Twenty-seven years old. He’s got a rap sheet. Mostly old drug possession charges. No recent arrests.”
Romano glanced back at Bree. “Check the glove box.”
Tugging on gloves, Bree rounded the vehicle and opened the passenger door. The cold might delay decomposition, but the vehicle still smelled nasty. Muscles relaxed upon death, releasing the contents of the bladder and bowels. There was no dignity in dying.
Ignoring the blood-and-gore-spattered interior, she used one finger to open the glove compartment. Inside, she found the normal paraphernalia: vehicle registration, a dog-eared Ford manual, a flashlight, and a box of crayons. “Nothing interesting.”
She removed a wallet from the center console and opened it. The driver’s license of James Tyson showed through the plastic window. Bree leaned into the vehicle and tilted her head until she could see the victim’s face and compare it to the license photo. “Looks like him.”
Pulling her head out of the compact SUV, she took a deep breath of cold, exhaust-tinted air. Glancing down at the wallet, she read off an address less than a mile away from the scene. She opened the billfold. “Forty-three dollars and two credit cards.”
So, probably not a robbery.