Free Love You More: A Novel by Lisa Gardner Page B

hasn’t magically called with permission to interview her yet, we’re gonna focus on Brian Darby. I want to talk to his boss. I want to know exactly what kind of man needs to color-code his closet and Peg-Board his garage.”
    “A control freak.”
    “Exactly. And when something or someone undermines that control—”
    “Just how violent does he get,” Bobby finished for her. They stood in the middle of the garage.
    “I don’t think a stranger abducted Sophie Leoni,” D.D. stated quietly.
    Bobby paused a heartbeat. “I don’t think so either.”
    “Meaning it’s him, or it’s her.”
    “He’s dead.”
    “Meaning, maybe Trooper Leoni finally wised up.”

8
     
    A woman never forgets the first time she is hit.
    I was lucky. My parents never whacked me. My father never slapped my face for talking back, or spanked my behind for willful disobedience. Maybe because I was never that disobedient. Or maybe, because by the time my father got home at night, he was too tired to care. My brother died and my parents became shells of their former selves, using up all their energy just getting through the day.
    By the time I was twelve, I’d come to terms with the morbid little household that passed as my own. I got into sports—soccer, softball, track team, anything that would keep me late after school and minimize the hours I spent on the homefront. Juliana liked sports, too. We were the Bobbsey twins, always in uniform, always rushing off somewhere.
    I took some hits on the playing field. A line drive to the chest that knocked me flat on my back. I realized for the first time that you really do see stars when the breath has been knocked from your lungs and your skull ricochets against the hard earth.
    Then there were miscellaneous soccer injuries, a head butt to thenose, cleats to the knee, the occasional elbow to the gut. Take it from me, girls can be tough. We dish out and man up with the best of them, particularly in the heat of battle, trying to score one for our team.
    But those injuries were nothing personal. Just the kind of collateral damage that happens when you and your opponent both want the ball. After the game, you shook hands, slapped each other on the butt, and meant it.
    First time I really had to fight was at the Academy. I knew I would receive rigorous training in hand-to-hand combat and I was looking forward to it. A lone female living in Boston? Hand-to-hand combat was an excellent idea, whether I made it as a trooper or not.
    For two weeks, we practiced drills. Basic defensive stances for protecting our face, our kidneys, and, of course, our sidearms. Never forget your weapon, we were lectured again and again. Most cops who lose their gun are then shot and killed with that gun. First line of defense, subdue the offending party before ever getting within arm’s length. But in the event things go sour and you find yourself in a personal combat situation, protect your weapon, and strike hard first chance you get.
    Turned out, I didn’t know how to deliver a punch. Sounded easy enough. But I fisted my hand wrong, had a tendency to overuse my arm, versus throwing my whole body behind the blow by rotating at the waist. So there were a couple more weeks, teaching all of us, even the big guys, how to pack a punch.
    Six weeks into it, the instructors decided we’d had enough drills. Time to practice what they’d preached.
    They divvied us up into two teams. We all donned protective padding and, to start, were armed with padded bars the instructors affectionately referred to as pogo sticks. Then, they turned us loose.
    Don’t believe for a second I got to fight another woman of my approximate size and weight. That would be too easy. As a female officer, I was expected to handle anything and anyone. So the trainers made their picks deliberately random. I ended up across from another recruit, named Chuck, who was six one, two hundred and forty pounds, and a former football player.
    He didn’t even try to