Cavanaugh Cold Case by Marie Ferrarella Read Free Book Online Page B

offer?”
    â€œ That is an observation,” she informed him tersely. She was telling him that she was aware he was looking to her to do all the heavy thinking here and he was just absorbing her answers without contributing. “Obviously too subtle for you.”
    His smile only grew more engaging. “I’m really not the subtle type.”
    â€œYes, I noticed,” she bit off. She didn’t know how to make it clearer than this. “Now, this might get you to first base or whatever base you’re aiming for with someone else, but I like to feel that I’m earning the money I’m being paid, so unless there’s something else you either want to ask me or share with me, please, leave,” she underscored.
    Instead of going the way she would have expected any normal male to do, he stayed exactly where he was, as if she’d just given him a choice. “Well, the idea of sharing doesn’t sound bad to me,” he began.
    She’d set herself up for that one, Kristin silently reprimanded herself. “Please, leave,” she repeated, and this time she made sure that there was nothing in her tone to leave any wiggle room for him to misinterpret her words.
    Malloy inclined his head, as if he’d finally gotten what she was telling him. “Until the next time,” he told her as he began to take his leave.
    â€œHeaven forbid,” Kristin muttered under her breath just loud enough to be heard.
    Opening the door, Malloy wound up all but walking into the two CSI agents who had been in charge of digging up the area where all the body parts had ultimately been found.
    Ryan O’Shea and Jake Reynolds were pushing a gurney with what looked to be a black body bag between them.
    â€œWhere do you want this, Doc?” O’Shea asked.
    Kristin didn’t need to ask what they’d brought in. The sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach told her the answer to that one.
    â€œMore?” she groaned, temporarily forgetting about the annoying detective who had invaded her turf and was still in it.
    O’Shea nodded. “It’s the gift that apparently just keeps on giving.”
    â€œHow much more giving?” she asked warily as she eyed the body bag.
    â€œWe found two more heads,” Reynolds told her, aligning the gurney with one of the exam tables and unzipping the bag.
    Kristin closed her eyes for a moment, as if trying to center herself before she spoke. Opening her eyes again, she looked at the body bag. It didn’t look full, but it didn’t appear to be empty, either.
    â€œJust the heads?” she asked.
    O’Shea had the good grace to look a little apologetic. “And a handful of miscellaneous bones that might or might not belong to the heads.”
    â€œIn other words, just like the rest of it.”
    â€œExactly like the rest of it,” O’Shea told her, then added quickly in a far more positive voice, “The good news is that I think that’s it.”
    â€œThe bad news is that there are twelve of them.” Malloy offered up that observation. Three sets of eyes turned toward him as he continued, “Twelve people without their entire bodies, without names and without a clue why they were unlucky enough to join this exclusive boneyard.”
    He studied the piles that were already out. Because of his upbringing, to him, bodies meant families. “And twelve families waiting for some word about one of their own who is never coming home again.”
    Kristin glanced in his direction, wondering if the detective had just said all that for her benefit, or if Malloy Cavanaugh actually did have a sensitive side to him.
    The next moment she decided that she was probably giving the man way too much credit. Someone who looked and acted the way that Malloy Cavanaugh did didn’t have to have a more sensitive side to him. From what she had heard about him, he did just fine with what genetics had given him to work