List of Secrets

CHAPTER ONE-4

New Year’s Eve, 2009. Benbrook, Texas.

Jerry Singletary was at home, alone, stoned and drunk out of his mind.

After the papers had announced to the world that he’d been one of the men caught up in an underage solicitation sting five days before Christmas, he hadn’t had a moment’s peace from the subsequent media frenzy. Being busted had parlayed into his home being raided, and the large quantity of child p*********y he possessed had sealed his fate completely. He had been released on a massively expensive bail after some wrangling, and already colleagues had distanced themselves – not a one that he’d called for help was willing to represent him.

That hurt. He’d known some of them for years.

He’d been immediately fired from the law firm as well, and last he’d heard, a lot of the cases he’d worked would now be under review for possible misconduct charges to pile onto him along with everything else.

If that happened, he’d be disbarred right around the time he got sent to prison.

Insult to injury.

He knocked back the rest of the Jameson, cursed and threw the empty bottle, lurched up unsteadily, and shuffled to the counter for a new bottle to continue his downward trend.

Now, sitting alone in his darkened house, no future in sight that he could see, he wallowed in self-pity. He’d have to represent himself in all this. No family – he was an only child, his parents were dead, his wife had bailed back in 1986 – and now, no friends for support either. His addled brain tried to make some sense of what his life had turned into, and just couldn’t.

Screw this, he thought hazily. Hot bath and sleep, and deal with it all in the morning. He stumbled upstairs to his jacuzzi tub, weaving dangerously, fresh bottle of Jameson in his hand.

He padded over to the counter and, with some difficulty and swearing, finally was able to turn on the radio. Jazz filled the air. He frowned, pressed another button, and grinned sloppily as Drowning Pool screamed at him from the speakers. “Thash better,” he slurred, bobbing his head to the beat.

Jerry ran the water, stripped down, climbed in. He pressed the button to turn the jets on full blast, leaned back and closed his eyes as the water and his music washed over him. He didn’t see the closet door slowly swing open.

The Raven crept silently to the side of the tub, and as Jerry remained blissfully unaware, pressed the rag of chloroform to his face. The resistance was minimal – thanks to a blood alcohol level almost four times the legal limit and massive tokes of some very strong pot not fifteen minutes earlier, Jerry couldn’t have fought off a fly.

A tiny shove was all it took to send Jerry Singletary’s head under the water permanently. He was so far under the influence from the pot, booze, and sedative that he didn’t even struggle as he drowned.

“Happy New Year,” the Raven told him as he placed a token of his visit on the bathroom counter. “Oh, and ironic choice of music, bro. But quite appropriate, don’t you think?” He crossed to the side of the tub, gazed at the lifeless face under the surface for a moment to make sure it was finished, then chuckled to himself as he left.

As he drove away, the Raven mulled over the night’s events. This had been one of those rare times that professional and hobby dovetailed into a single target. Singletary had already been in his sights to deal with at some point, and then the paid contract to end him had been offered. As a result, killing Jerry Singletary had been satiating all the way around.

Doesn’t get much better than this, he thought happily as he cranked the radio.

* * *

* * * *

New year, new things to accomplish. She’d drilled down into her next target’s life for four hours straight and her eyes were beginning to cross. She rubbed them, got up to move around and restore blood flow in her legs, then walked to the kitchen, got herself more water, and returned to her computer desk.

She sighed, stretched again, then resumed her seat and her research. Her eyebrows raised. Hmm. Made the U.S. Olympic team in 1990, 1994, 1998. Missed making it in 2002 and 2006. She wondered if he’d be focused currently on making the 2010 squad for Vancouver; if he was, it would be much harder to approach and distract him. Then again, at forty-one, most skiers had already ended their Olympic chase; the average age of the 2006 team was only twenty-seven years old. She decided she’d have to risk it. She’d make sure to cross his path and hope he didn’t have training tunnel vision.

This was almost going to be a shame. She did appreciate talent.

She pulled his picture up again. Definite hottie, and only five years her senior. This one she wouldn’t mind letting touch her one bit. As she reviewed her plans, she realized it might come to that; it might be the only way to get close enough to do what she had to do. Hazards of the work, she told herself, and grinned. Sometimes you gotta take one for the mission. She looked at his picture again. And I am completely okay with that. When they look like this, I’d take several.

She opened another browser window, pulled up a travel site, made her arrangements. Then she headed off to bed.

* * *

* * * *

Frank Zimmerman sat on his couch flipping channels and working his way through another bottle of Wild Turkey at three a.m. after yet another tedious shift at work. Another year of this, he thought sourly, referring to his patrol beat. He wanted to hold out until he turned fifty-five to retire, but as miserable as he was, he didn’t know if he could stand another year of it.

Dammit, he wasn’t meant for this. He’d been born to be a detective, had known all his life that’s what he was destined to be. And he’d been good at it. But after what had come to light, he couldn’t face the possibility of pursuing and persecuting another innocent. He took a long pull from his bottle and tried desperately to quiet the accusing voices in his head. Every time Frank closed his eyes, he pictured the poor man’s face again, drawn and pale, his shoulders slumped in defeat, the way he flinched as if struck when the judge had sentenced him to life in prison and banged the gavel, the way he’d sobbed and pleaded as he’d been led away to his fate.

I helped put him there, Frank chastised himself yet again. Young hotshot detective out to prove myself, so f*****g determined that I was right, I was so sure that it was him... I was so very, very wrong. And he died there. Tears slid down his cheeks as the memories broke him all over again, and he polished off the bottle in a futile effort to ease the pain. God, I wish I could take it back. As he stumbled toward his room, his cell phone buzzed repeatedly, forgotten on the coffee table.

* * *

* * * *

Lizzie waited, fingers tapping out a beat, listening to her dad’s phone ring and ring on the other end. And sighed. She knew he was on second shift rotation this month, so he should be home. She’d caught another case that just wasn’t feeling right to her, and she wanted to pick his brain about it and see if he could help her figure out what she was missing.

She’d only recently made detective, after paying her dues and working her way up the ranks for seven grueling years. When she finally received her detective’s badge, she honestly had not been able to tell who was prouder – her or her father. Her mother, on the other hand, had never been supportive of Lizzie’s career choice at all. “It’s the whole reason we got divorced,” her mother reminded her constantly. “I didn’t want to have that life, worried sick every time your dad left for work, and I don’t want to have to be worried sick when you go to work either.”

It had escalated over time into a huge knockdown drag out fight between the two; her mother called her selfish, and Lizzie finally exploded and told her mother exactly what she thought of being ripped from the father she idolized when she was twelve and dragged over two thousand miles away against her will.

They hadn’t spoken since that night, which was just fine with Lizzie.

She sighed again as her dad’s voice came on, asking her to please leave a message. She did so at the beep, then, reluctantly, she hung up and returned to her latest puzzle.