THE BRIDGE by Carol Ericson Read Free Book Online Page B

clenched her teeth.
    Detective Brody stepped in front of her as if to shield her from the other detective’s words and the image they’d already created in her head.
    “We’ll discuss the rest of this on the way.”
    Sergeant Curtis dipped his head. “Sorry, Ms. Duran. I’ll ride with you, Brody.”
    “Are you going to be okay?” Detective Brody made a half turn toward her.
    “I’m fine.” Elise held up her hands. “I’m going straight to my friend’s house after this.”
    “How will I reach you? We have to keep your phone.”
    “I should hope so.” She shivered and rubbed her arms. “I’ll pick up another phone today and contact you with the new number.”
    “Make sure you do. And Elise—” he pinned her with his dark gaze “—don’t go back to your house.”
    She drew a cross over her heart. “I promise.”
    And that’s the only thing she’d promise him right now.
    Fifteen minutes later Elise sat in her car, her hands clutching the steering wheel. She could do this. She needed to know more, had a right to know more.
    She rolled out of the parking garage and hung a left. She knew better than to follow Detective Brody’s car. The guy seemed to be on high alert at all times. He’d notice one small hybrid following him to a crime scene.
    Besides, she already knew the way. Hadn’t her life almost ended in the exact same spot?
    When she pulled into the parking lot for the bridge, she didn’t have to worry about standing out. The tourist season was in high gear, and a trip to the Golden Gate Bridge was high on everyone’s list.
    A crowd of people had already formed at the edge of the lot where it led down to the gravel by the water. She stumbled from her car, and a brisk breeze cut her to the bone. She fished a sweater out of her backseat and put it on over her bulky cable knit. You could never have too many layers in San Francisco.
    She scrambled from the car and tugged the sweater around her tighter, unrolling the sleeves so they hung over her hands. She shuffled up to the fringes of the crowd.
    “What happened?” Elise stood on her tiptoes, not knowing what she hoped she would or wouldn’t see.
    A man looked over his shoulder. “There’s a dead body down there.”
    The woman standing to her right clicked her tongue. “Is it a jumper?”
    That’s what the city workers had thought of her. Is that what this killer wanted everyone to believe? No. He wanted to shout his deeds from the rooftops. He wanted the distinction of impressing everyone with his cleverness or he never would’ve left that note for Brody.
    The tall man in front of her snorted. “That’s not a jumper this close to the shore. The current’s too fast out there.”
    Elise ducked and shimmied between two of the curious onlookers. She zeroed in on Detective Brody’s unmistakable form, his arm raised as if directing traffic.
    Someone had covered the body with a sheet, securing the four corners against the wind that snatched at its edges. Frustrated in its efforts to pluck the sheet from the dead body, the wind found another outlet, puffing up the sheet so that it looked like a sail at full speed ahead.
    But that girl wasn’t going anywhere—ever.
    Elise didn’t know what she’d hoped to discover out here, but as soon as the other detective had burst into the interrogation room, she knew she had to see the crime scene for herself.
    Had the killer intended this little patch of desolate shore as her final resting place? She turned her face to the right and gazed at the beach a short distance away where she’d scrambled into the water to save her life.
    Had he killed this woman here or was this just his dumping ground?
    She asked no one in particular. “Wh-who found her?”
    The man with the broad shoulders turned sharply, bumping Elise’s arm. “It’s a woman? Who told you it was a woman?”
    Elise grabbed the ponytail that whipped across her face. “Oh! I don’t know. I guess I just assumed...”
    The woman beside