Free Cavanaugh's Surrender by Marie Ferrarella Page A

standing near the doorway, talking on his cell. Or rather, the older, disgruntled-looking man was cursing into his phone.
    “Problem, Lieutenant?” he asked mildly as the other man abruptly disconnected the call that was apparently creating his less than jovial mood.
    “Only if you call working with half a squad a problem. That was Wakefield, calling in sick. This is worse than when we had the blue flu,” he grumbled, referring to an incident several years back. At that time, an inordinate number of the uniformed officers called in sick in protest over what they felt was a wrongful disciplinary action of one of their own. Now that he recalled, Brian Cavanaugh had looked into the matter, found the charges to be false and had all actions dropped.
    “Nearly half of my men are out sick,” the lieutenant bit off in frustration. “I just hope the crazies don’t start coming out of the woodwork.” He looked at Logan as if seeing him for the first time. “You close that suicide case that came in last night?”
    “Funny thing about that, Lieutenant.”
    Bailey’s dark eyes grew even darker as he glared at him over his hawklike, patrician nose. “You’re not going to tell me that wasn’t a suicide, are you?”
    Logan ignored the warning note in the lieutenant’s voice. He didn’t believe in hiding information. The man needed to be kept in the loop, at least to some extent. “Well, yeah, actually I am,” Logan told him, then quickly added, “But there’s more,” before Bailey could unleash his mercurial temper.
    “More?” The lieutenant stared at him in disbelief. “What kind of ‘more’?” he asked.
    Logan knew what he was about to say wouldn’t be welcome, but in this case, he found himself agreeing with Destiny. “It looks like this might be the work of a serial killer.”
    Bailey sank down in Sullivan’s chair. “Aw, hell, no.”
    Taking a seat behind his own desk, Logan nodded. “I’m afraid so.”
    It took less than a minute for Bailey to rally. He was back in fighting form and ready to issue a challenge. “Who the hell says it’s a serial killer?” he demanded angrily.
    Logan was about to say that it was the victim’s sister, but then decided it sounded better if he fell back on Destiny’s title at the crime lab instead. If nothing else, it carried some weight.
    “One of the CSIs. The head of the day shift’s chief assistant,” he said, deliberately not referring to him as his father. He and his siblings had all earned their present positions, and the less attention paid to the fact that their father was the head of the crime lab, the better for everyone all around. “She found five other open, suspicious ‘suicide’ cases that had far too many similarities to this case to just shrug off and pass over.”
    “And you looked these cases over and agreed?” Bailey pressed.
    “I haven’t had a chance yet,” Logan told him truthfully. “But I was just about to do that.” As he talked, Logan turned on his computer. It took the machine several seconds to respond and come to life.
    “All right, you do that.” Bailey sounded exasperated as he issued the order. Rising to his feet, he nodded at the desk he’d just vacated. “When’s Sullivan supposed to be coming back?”
    The wedding had taken place only last weekend. The lieutenant had been invited but hadn’t attended. Unlike Brian Cavanaugh, he didn’t believe in socializing with his men.
    “Not for another week and a half,” Logan answered.
    The news was not well received. Bailey’s frown intensified.
    “Well, I can’t give you anyone else from the squad. Half of them are out sick and the other half are up to their ears in unsolved cases. This month’s stats are going straight to hell.”
    “The chief assistant offered to work with me on this one—if it’s okay with you, Lieutenant,” Logan added.
    As a rule, he preferred to ask forgiveness rather than permission, but seeing as how this was right out in front of him and