LITMIR.BIZ

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been victimized.

      Andrew pretended to shake his head. “Ah, the sound of squabbling children, how could I have forgotten what that was like?”

      All but two of his children had moved out, but the apartment Clay had been subletting from an aspiring actor had suddenly been reclaimed by its owner when the latter returned from the east coast. That left Clay without a place to stay. Temporarily.

      Temporarily had already woven its way into two months without any visible signs of terminating. And Andrew, secretly, couldn’t have been happier even though he said nothing out loud to confirm it.

      “Hey, if you didn’t want them coming around, Dad, you’d stop leaving food out for them to find,” Lorrayne pointed out.

      “Respect your elders, Squirt,” Shaw told her just before he drank deeply of his third cup of leaded coffee.

      Rayne lifted her chin defensively, her blue-gray eyes narrowing beneath her bangs. “Just who are you calling Squirt?”

      Knowing that the only way to quiet this crowd was to arm herself with a handful of tranquilizer darts and use them effectively, Callie crossed into the living room to get away from the din before placing her call to the number registered on her beeper. A glance at the screen told her the transmission signal had returned.

      Holding one hand over her ear as she turned away from the breakfast noise, she quickly hit the keypad numbers with her thumb.

      “This is Cavanaugh,” she said the second she heard someone pick up on the other end. “You paged me?”

      “Better get down here, Callie.”

      She recognized the voice. It belonged to the man she’d been partnered with until recently. Seth Adams. The man had made detective five years before she had and had resented being “saddled” with her. He’d thought nepotism had placed her where she was. He’d soon learned that it was aptitude that had gotten her her badge, nothing more, nothing less. Still, they blended together like oil and water. The captain agreed that a separation was in order.

      “What’s up?” she wanted to know.

      “We’ve got a dead woman on the sidewalk. Looks like she was struck and thrown by a car.”

      She waited for something more to follow. When it didn’t, she asked, “Hit-and-run?”

      “Absolutely.”

      It didn’t make sense to her. “Vehicular manslaughter. How’s that my territory?”

      Callie dealt with the living, not the dead. Specifically, with searching for missing persons. It was a department that was near and dear to her father’s heart. Fifteen years ago, her mother had gotten into her car and driven away. She never came back. The car was eventually found submerged in a lake twenty miles north of Aurora, but no amount of searching had ever turned up her body.

      Her father never gave up the hope that someday Rose Cavanaugh would come walking back into the house she’d stormed out of in the wake of an argument her father never stopped blaming himself for. In some small way, Callie felt that by working in missing persons she kept up her father’s hope that her mother was still alive.

      “She wasn’t alone, Callie. From all appearances, the woman had a little girl with her. The first cop on the scene went through the dead woman’s wallet. Delia Anne Culhane. Judge Brenton Montgomery’s housekeeper.” He paused for a moment, letting the words sink in. “The missing kid is his daughter.”

      A knot came out of nowhere and tightened itself in the pit of her stomach as she recognized the name.

      “I’ll be right there.” Hanging up, Callie turned around. Her father was standing just shy of the threshold, watching her. He couldn’t have gotten very much from her side of the conversation, she thought. She debated saying something to him. He knew Montgomery better than she did. Another time, she decided. “I’ve got to get going.”

      It was then that she noticed her father was holding a brown paper bag in his hand. Full if the bulge in the middle was any indication.

      He held it out to her. “Packed you a lunch.” He smiled, the character lines about his eyes crinkling. “In case you get hungry one of these days.”

      She knew he meant well, but she wasn’t thirteen anymore, being sent off to school. “Dad—”

      Taking her hand, he closed her fingers around the top of the bag. “Humor me. I’ve been both mother and father to this bunch for fifteen years.” His smile took twenty years off his age. “These parental urges get hard to fight sometimes.”

      As always, she retreated from the line of skirmish. She’d learned long ago to pick her fights, and this wasn’t worth more than a few words. She grinned at him, nodding at the bag. “Will I like it?”

      The expression on Andrew’s face was incredulous, as if he couldn’t believe she had to ask. “Is the pope Catholic?”

      “Last I checked.” She paused to kiss his cheek. “Thanks, Dad.” The words had nothing to do with the lunch he’d tucked into her hand, and everything to do with the care he’d spent raising her right.

      Embarrassed, Andrew waved her on her way. “Go. They’re waiting on you.” He guessed at the caller. “Tell Adams I said hello.”

      Callie stopped. She hadn’t told him who was on the phone. “How is it you know everything?”

      He gave her a crooked grin. “I’m old. I’m supposed to know everything. I’ve got it in writing. Now get going before the crime scene gets contaminated.”

      If it hasn’t already been, she thought. Nodding, Callie hurried out the door she’d used less than ten minutes ago.

      An hour and a half later, Callie paused outside the closed doors of the courtroom. Gathering courage and the right words.

      There were no right words. Not for this.

      The corridor on the second floor was mostly empty. Courts were in session behind the black double doors that lined both sides of the long hallway. If she listened intently, she could swear that she could almost hear various lives being altered.

      And behind this particular set of doors some family’s life was being rearranged by a man known to be both just and fair. And not easily swayed by pretense. A dark, sober man who brooked no nonsense, stood for no lies. And had had his share of grief.

      And she was going to add to it.

      Callie let out a long breath, then took in another, centering herself. She’d just left the scene of the accident.

      The scene of the crime, she amended grimly.

      The judge’s housekeeper, a woman in her late thirties, still pretty, still with so much life ahead of her, had died instantly, according to the coroner’s preliminary findings. And, despite the fact that the hit-and-run had occurred on the corner of a well-traveled street, there had been no witnesses to see what had happened. At least none who had come forward so far.

      But it was still early.

      Because there were no witnesses, there would have been no reason to suspect that the dead woman, who had been in the judge’s employ for just over four years, hadn’t been alone.

      If it wasn’t for the pink backpack found twenty feet from the body.

      Rachel Montgomery’s backpack.

      A backpack but no Rachel Montgomery.

      And it was up to her to tell this to the judge. To tell him that the peaceful world he’d left just a short while ago was no more. His housekeeper was gone and quite possibly so was his daughter.

      Staring at the black door closest to her, Callie squared her shoulders. This kind of thing was never easy. Adams had said he was willing to go see the judge and tell him what had happened, but she’d vetoed that. He’d looked at her in surprise when she had volunteered to be the one to

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