The Girl Who Disappeared Twice (Forensic Instincts 1)

Fisher howled with pain.

“I’m just getting started,” Marc promised menacingly. He dragged Fisher up and slammed his back against the wall. “You okay?” he called out to Casey, who was scrambling to her feet.

“A hell of a lot better than I was thirty seconds ago,” she managed.

“Good.” He turned his attention back to Fisher. “Talk,” he ordered, one knee pushed into Fisher’s groin and one elbow digging into his windpipe.

“The girl came on to me,” Fisher said, then yelped, sweat beading on his forehead. “She—” His breath caught as Marc increased the pressure of his knee.

“Wrong answer. Tell me about your plans for this girl—and what you did with all the others.” He leaned closer, until his face nearly touched the other man’s. “You don’t want to know what I am or what I’m capable of. Compared to me, you’re a Girl Scout.” His elbow shoved deeper, cutting off most of Fisher’s oxygen. “Now tell me about the girls—all of them. And don’t spare any details. I’m a captive audience.”

It took longer than expected to get Fisher’s confession. It took a Navy SEAL’s thumb dug deeply into his collarbone, causing blinding pain that persisted long after the pressure was removed, and the threat that a repeat performance would increase the pain tenfold if that’s what it took to make the perp talk—assuming his neck didn’t snap first. The bastard’s cold-blooded confession had made bile rise in Casey’s throat. He might be going to jail for a long, long time, but Casey wished they were throwing away the key for good.

“I’m done here, Marc,” she told her rescuer. “Otherwise I’m going to be sick.”

“Go,” he urged quietly. “I’ll wrap things up here and head over to the precinct. The bodies will be found. Any claim of coercion will be tossed. It’s a murderer’s word against ours. The confession will stick. Go home.”

Home was a four-story Tribeca brownstone that was residence and office combined. There was no beating that. One mortgage. One place that held all her worldly possessions. And no commute. It was ideal.

Of course, she rarely made it up to the fourth floor, which was supposedly where she slept. Her bed was a casual acquaintance, if not a stranger. She virtually lived in her office. That was her choice. One she made every day. And she wasn’t sorry.

With a quick glance around the reception level, she turned left and climbed the L-shaped staircase to the second floor. Directly ahead, she’d had French doors installed—doors that led out to a balcony overlooking the manicured garden in a gated backyard. Colorful flower beds. A maze of closely trimmed shrubs. And a pair of graceful willow trees on either side, rippling in the breeze. The entire effect was both serene and eye-catching.

Pushing open the doors, Casey stepped outside for a moment, quickly shutting them behind her. She hoped the cool air would revive her. Sighing, she noted that the sun was now well above the horizon, and climbing rapidly into the sky. Her watch told her it was nine-thirty. The unofficial coercion Marc had inflicted had taken a lot longer than expected to work. To Casey, it had seemed like an eternity before they’d pulled it off and extracted a full confession from Fisher.

She could still feel the perv’s slimy hands on her. He’d really freaked her out.

With a shudder, Casey reminded herself that they had pulled it off, and gotten both—Fisher and his confession regarding the other victims. Not a pretty business. Still, the haunting, disturbing feelings inflicted by such men were the very reason she’d formed Forensic Instincts, LLC to begin with.

She walked across the balcony and reached the second set of French doors that led back into the brownstone. She held her access card up to the card reader and punched her security code into the Hirsch keypad. Pushing the doors open, she stepped inside and shut the doors behind her. No time for rest—not yet. It was time for her team’s post-op meeting.

Forensic Instincts had been just a dream at first. Now it was very much a reality.

It all started four years ago, and was still in its fledgling state. Casey had begun her quest to assemble an awesome team, with herself at the helm. Thanks to her extensive credentials working with both behavioral and psychological profilers, her innate talent at reading people, and her years of working in both law enforcement and the private sector, Casey had easily transitioned into an independent profiler. She held a master’s in Forensic Psychology from John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and a bachelor’s in Psychology from Columbia. Most importantly, she was a natural at figuring out what made people tick.

Her two other team members were impressive as hell. She should know. She’d meticulously selected them. Assessed them. Recruited them. They were very different from each other. Both brought specialized capabilities to the Forensic Instincts team. The result was a growing track record of successfully solved complex criminal cases.

Their trio was unique, but still formative. Which meant they were sometimes welcomed, and other times regarded as a huge pain in the ass.

But, overall, they were earning a growing respect among law enforcement agencies and, more important, among their expanding client list. To those who hired them, they were the ultimate beacon of hope.

Her rules were few, but absolute. Unwavering loyalty, both to the company and to one another. One hundred and ten percent of themselves when they were on the job. Total candor, regardless of the cost—but only when they were behind closed doors. A low profile—which meant staunchly avoiding the limelight. As mavericks who pushed the boundaries more than conventional bureaucracy would allow, it was best to be unrecognizable. They were an eclectic trio, each of whom believed absolutely in his or her specific methods.

Three egos were involved. And none of them shy. That meant frequent debates, tons of constructive argument and—sometimes—stubborn unwillingness to budge. With the Fisher case, Casey had wanted to nail their perp by studying his interactions with college-aged women, then combining behavioral observations with her experience and sheer instinct. Marc had argued in favor of using statistics and past research to form a solid scientific base from which he’d work up a profile before going in for the kill. And Ryan was adamant about implementing game theory—getting inside Fisher’s head, figuring out his sick reasoning—where he chose to hunt, and the strategies he used to go after his prey. The twenty-eight-year-old guy was an awesome combination of technology genius and strategic thinker. He studied behavioral patterns through complex computer programming and crunching enormous amounts of raw data, and then applied it to his analysis of human dynamics.

Each team member believed ferv

ently in his or her methods. Fortunately, the whole was greater than the sum of its parts.

Yes, they made quite a team—strong willed, but the best. Casey expected nothing less as she expanded the operations, and Forensic Instincts grew. Her grandfather would have been proud. She’d used her trust fund wisely and well.

Smiling faintly, she looked around. The second set of French doors had granted her entry to the second-floor conference room. It was the largest and most elaborate space in the brownstone.

As she walked in, an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling video screens began to glow. A long, green line formed across each panel, pulsating from left to right. Then, a soothing voice, that seemed to emanate from every cubic inch of the room, said, “Welcome back, Casey,” bending each line into the contour of the voice pattern. It continued, “Warning. Heart rate elevated.”

Casey started. She just couldn’t get used to being greeted by Yoda, the latest incarnation of Ryan McKay—Forensic Instincts’ brilliant techno-wizard—and his artificial intelligence system. Somehow the damned thing knew who was in the room. It even knew when something was out of the ordinary. Like now. No matter how many times Ryan tried to explain to her how Yoda worked, to Casey it still sounded like magic.

The conference room was pure class. Polished hardwood floors. A plush Oriental rug. An expansive mahogany conference table and matching credenza. And, most crucial of all, a technology infrastructure that was light-years ahead of its time in both design and operation, all hidden from view. Only the gigantic video wall was visible, covering the longest side of the room and allowing Ryan to assemble a dizzying array of information into a large single image or several smaller, simultaneous data feeds. Videoconferencing equipment, an elaborate phone system, and a personalized virtual workstation available to each member of the group completed the elaborate system.