Free Judas Kiss by J.T. Ellison Page B

Cold Case team. Taylor didn’t envy their jobs a bit. She couldn’t imagine working full-time with the lost, spending all her time living other people’s pain and agony. Taylor was convinced that in order to heal, a victim’s family just needed to know what actually happened. For those who were missing, who were dead with no killer captured, no answers, the waiting was unbearable. Nashville had plenty of cases that fit this précis, and six or seven that were actively being worked.
    With a brief wave at two of the B shift detectives, she went into her office and shut the door behind her.
    Absolutely astounding. Looking at the top of the wooden desk, Taylor couldn’t help but think of a tornado’s aftermath. When she’d left the night before, everything was in its place, the in-box and out-box were empty, and the desktop was completely clear. Now, it was overflowing. She spied at least four incident reports from the Wolff crime scene, a couple of red actionable items from upstairs, an empty threeing binder some kind soul had thought to provide, knowing she’d be collecting all the information for its innards, creating a new murder book labeled Wolff. Several multicolored sticky notes, a full call sheet, a brief scattering of pens and pencils. A shaft of moonlight peeked through the open blinds, illuminating a white sheet of basketball brackets with a hot pink postie reminding her to make her picks before Thursday at noon or else she wouldn’t be able to participate in the yearly NCAA pool. Away for a day and the desk bloomed like forsythia, one moment barren and empty, the next full of unruly flowers. With a sigh, she slipped around to her seat and started organizing. She couldn’t work in chaos, never had been able to tolerate a mess in her proximity.
    Her voice-mail light was blinking. She played the messages. The only one of interest was from Lincoln Ross. Oh, thank goodness. It was good to hear his voice.
    She never realized how much she missed being around her team until they weren’t there. She’d missed them all while she and Baldwin were away, and returned to the news that Lincoln Ross had been tapped for an assignment. A “Special Assignment.” That’s all she’d been told. She could guess what cases might be important enough to put a homicide detective on a full-time assignment, had made a few attempts to get information from her captain, Mitchell Price. He’d only smiled and nodded with each guess, not giving her the satisfaction of knowing which supposition was correct.
    Setting a sheaf of paper aside, she flipped open her cell phone and dialed the number. Lincoln answered on the first ring, his deep, honeyed voice tinged with irony.
    â€œThank God it’s you, LT. I have a problem,” Lincoln said.
    â€œTalk to me. I miss you, by the way. Are you ever coming off this project?”
    â€œI hope so. I think things are about to break. This stupid confidential informant got me in a world of hurt, and I had to push back. That’s part of the problem.”
    â€œWhat happened?”
    She heard the deep, readying breath. “I had to partake.” He spat the words out as if saying them would ease a bad taste in his mouth.
    â€œOh, Lincoln. You know that’s not—”
    The despair in his voice broke her heart. “Shit, LT, I know. Trust me, it was drilled into me a thousand times before I got involved in this case. I didn’t have a choice. This is getting dicey. I didn’t know what else to do.”
    â€œWhat was it?”
    â€œWhat else. Crack. Messed me up good, too, even though I barely had a hit. God, LT. It was terrible. You don’t think they’ll fire me?”
    Taylor laughed. “No, I don’t. My God, Linc, you’re one of the finest officers we employ. If you said there was no other choice, I believe you, and so will Price. He’ll go to the mat for you. How’d you get yourself