Raintree: Haunted (Raintree 2)

They were mostly undressed when she leaned against Gideon’s bare chest and tipped her face up to look him in the eye. “I have an appointment to interview Frank Stiles Monday afternoon.”

“You’re going to make him confess, is that it?”

Hope nodded. “Yeah. You did your part, now I’ll do mine.”

She was good at getting criminals to confess. She and Gideon hadn’t been working together long enough for him to know that about her, but he would learn. Soon enough.

“What makes you so good at getting confessions?” Gideon teased as he brushed back a strand of hair that had fallen across her cheek. “You think just because you’re prettier than all the other detectives, the bad guys are going to give it up for you?”

“No. I’m actually an excellent poker player, Raintree. I’m very good at bluffing my way to a confession. You give me enough information so I can bluff well, and I’ll charm a confession right out of Stiles.”

“Poor guy doesn’t have a chance.”

“Yeah, well, life’s not fair.”

Gideon held her, and she melted into him. It felt good to be embraced with love and passion and unexpected tenderness. She’d never known it would be so good to have a place to rest at the end of the day, a special person to rest with.

“I was so worried about you,” she confessed. “When I saw Tabby point that gun at you and fire, and yo

u fell…”

“I’m fine,” Gideon said.

“I know, but…” The words caught in her throat. With the good came the bad. With the happiness, the worry.

Gideon leaned Hope back a little and kissed her throat. “Since you’re feeling vulnerable, partner, maybe we should renegotiate that sex on the desk ban….”

Sunday—11:36 a.m.

“At least she didn’t get up and walk away from us this time,” the coroner said as he walked around Tabby’s covered body.

Gideon had tried to convince Hope to stay at home this morning, but she wouldn’t have it. She’d insisted on coming with him. One of these days he was going to have to quit protecting her so diligently. She didn’t like it much.

But he wasn’t going to quit today.

“It was the shot to the head that killed her,” the coroner said without emotion. “The bullet that hit her torso missed the heart and lodged in the spine. That alone wouldn’t have killed her. Would’ve stopped her cold, though.”

Hope, who had never killed anyone before last night, paled a little. She’d been the one to pull the trigger and stop Tabby; she’d done what had to be done. Neither of them felt one iota of guilt. Tabby was one of the most evil people he’d ever met, and she didn’t deserve a place on this earth.

“What was it you wanted me to see?” Gideon asked. He hated this place. He could live down here for years and never find a way to send all the ghosts to a peaceful place.

With help from an assistant, the coroner uncovered the body on the slab and gently rolled it over. “I’ve never seen anything quite like this. I thought it was a tattoo at first, but it’s actually a birthmark. I know some birthmarks are shaped in such a way as to resemble something else, but this crescent moon on the corpse’s shoulder blade is absolutely perfect. And it’s such an unusual color. I thought it might be helpful in identifying her.”

Gideon stared at the blue birthmark of a crescent moon. It was, as the coroner had already observed, perfect in shape and color.

“Oh, shit,” he said softly.

“What is it?” Hope asked.

Gideon ran for the door as he reached for his cell phone, and Hope followed him. “Tabby said they,” he muttered. “And she was afraid for her own life if she missed killing me. Of course she was afraid. She wanted Echo, too. She said so at your mother’s apartment.”

“Raintree.” Hope followed him up the stairs at a run. “What are you talking about?”

He couldn’t get a signal, so he cursed at the phone as they burst from the building and stepped into the sunshine. “Her name is Tabby Ansara. We thought they were down. Defeated and powerless and…dammit. This changes everything.”

While he was moving away from the corner of the building in an attempt to get a decent signal, the phone rang. Instead of giving Hope the phone, as he often had in days past, he answered himself and got an earful of static.

It was Dante. Gideon couldn’t make out every word, but he very clearly heard the two he most needed to hear.