She couldn’t.
Not until her sister’s murderer was brought to justice.
Chapter 2
Jag snagged his mug of steaming hot coffee along with Callie’s book and made his way to his front porch where he had the most beautiful view of Puget Sound. One of the biggest reasons he was willing to spend a ridiculous amount of money on rent for this prime piece of real estate.
But because he sat on the corner and up high on the hill, he could also see down the road, into town and the Saratoga Inn.
Well, at least one small part of it.
Damn, she looked good. No, great. Better than great. She’d been the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on and how he ended up engaged to her for less than twenty-four hours he’d never understand. Not only had she been way out of his league, but they couldn’t be more different. She was all glitz and glam. She was all about the story, and she’d step on anyone to get it.
Including him.
He was all brawn and ego. All he cared about was the job and having the best record in the department. It meant so much to him that it clouded his judgment and because of that, he couldn’t see what was right in front of his face.
Adam Wanton wasn’t the Trinket Killer. He couldn’t have been. Had Jag been doing his job, he would have questioned the fact that Adam had no trinkets to his name. As a matter of fact, he had a flare for expensive items, and his girlfriend had only the finest of jewelry.
No costume jewelry in her collection anywhere.
But none of that added up to his innocence.
However, the discrepancies in DNA at various crime scenes should have given him pause, but he was too damn fucking excited to wrap up another case.
Seattle’s golden boy. That’s what people had started calling him, and it had gone to his head.
The dark night sky had started to turn light blue as the sun tried to peek over the horizon. Jag had barely slept a wink. He’d tossed and turned, thinking only of the days and nights he’d had the pleasure of having the magnificent Callie in his arms. He’d fallen head over heels in love with her, and he didn’t think he’d ever be able to get her out from under his skin.
Having her back in the Seattle area only made matters worse.
Her asking him for help and him denying her damn near killed him.
He sipped his coffee as he flipped open the book. She’d been extremely kind to him in the pages he’d read so far, which confused him because the title was a huge dig. However, when she got to chapter ten, she did rip him a new one about the arrest.
He made one mistake in procedure by jumping the gun and executing the arrest before the warrant had actually been issued, and she harped on it for eight pages.
Quickly, he flipped to chapter fifteen which discussed all the DNA evidence. The blood evidence that had been gathered at the five of the crime scenes, including Stephanie’s, that belonged to Adam Wanton had been contaminated. It could have been because the crime scene had been compromised, or it could have been planted there. The thing was, it didn’t match the blood at any of the other scenes. That unknown DNA is, in part, what allowed Adam to walk.
But what was even weirder was when Leslie Armstrong, one of the lab techs, admitted to tampering with the samples. Two days later, Leslie killed herself.
Why would she do either of those things?
Of course, Callie believed that Armstrong had been murdered. But by who? It certainly wasn’t the Trinket Killer.
Jag had more questions than answers, and this stupid book wasn’t helping.
He stared off into the sound, watching the ferry take the next boatload of people into the city. Life on the island was different. It moved at a snail’s pace, and Jag had finally begun to settle in and enjoy the lack of adrenaline rush he thought he needed to survive. He never wished anyone to be killed, but a year ago at this time, if there were no murderers, he’d be sitting at his desk twiddling his thumbs, praying for something to happen.
Today, he’d take thumb twiddling any day of the week to a murder investigation. Finding out who stole Jimmy Brendel’s bicycle last week was about all the excitement he needed.
He scratched the side of his head.
There had been a slight MO (modus operandi) change halfway through the Trinket Killer murders. It had been Callie who pointed out that the trinkets went from gold to silver. He’d like to believe he would have picked up on it, but if he was being totally honest with himself, he’d started to lose his edge to his ego.
The alarm on his cell went off, which meant it was time to head into the office, which was literally almost directly across the street.
He refilled his coffee, locked his door, and headed down the road, leaving Callie’s book behind.
Levi Crawford had been instrumental in helping him get the placement as chief of police in the small town of Langley, where he was in charge of four other officers and a population of a little over one thousand citizens. Had it not been for Levi, Jag might have been fired.
Not for the Trinket Killer case, but for what happened after.
What a shitshow.
He pushed open the door to city hall and turned right. “Good morning, Isabelle. How are you? More importantly, how’s that little baby of yours?”
“She’s doing great, thanks for asking.” Isabelle smiled like the proud new mommy she was. So young, only twenty-five, but she had a maturity about her, and he was damn glad she decided to keep working. Of course, he would have opened a daycare in city hall to keep her if that’s what it
