Cold Hearted (Cold Justice Book 6) Read Online Free PDF Page B

she was picking her battles.
    The computer screen opened to an unfinished essay. The girl had stopped halfway through a sentence about serial harassment and bullying.
    “Her music is paused,” Donovan noted. “Press play,” she instructed over his shoulder.
    “Did Evidence dust this for prints?” He indicated the computer. Useable fingerprints were a lot harder to find than most people realized.
    She nodded. “They examined it, but didn’t see any. Didn’t dust because of the risk to the computer itself. We’ll bag it to check for contact DNA before the computer boys get their hands on it.”
    The detective rested her hands on her hips, and he forced himself not to notice the way the cotton of her shirt clung to the curves of her body. So much for the zone. He pressed play, and they both flinched at the volume. He recognized the band and the song—Halestorm’s “In your room.” A little too close to the bone.
    He flicked it back off, and he and Donovan looked at one another in the sudden silence. “Was this music turned on or off when the first responders arrived?”
    “Off.”
    “You sure?” he asked.
    “ I was the first responder, along with Officer Mason. We were called out on an intruder alert. The music wasn’t playing then. You think the perp turned it off?”
    “Someone called in an intruder alert?” This was news to him. He’d received the barest of details before he’d jumped into some tiny turboprop aircraft that had dumped him at the closest airfield.
    Erin shifted uncomfortably. “Since Drew Hawke’s arrest we’ve had a spate of false reports from this address. We responded as we always do, but we didn’t take it too seriously. A third housemate arrived home when I was on the doorstep. She let herself inside. Found the bodies.” And Donovan was beating herself up over not breaking down the door the moment she arrived.
    “You thought they were prank calling?”
    “Not prank.” The expression on her face wasn’t bitterness, but it was a close cousin—regret. “They were deliberately provoking the police, but my chief wanted us to go easy on them.”
    “Because their parents are loaded?”
    Her blue eyes flashed. “Because I’d arrested one of their friends, and they seemed genuinely distressed by events. They were going through a bad time.” She released an unsteady breath. “And their parents are loaded.”
    He looked at the body on the bed. She’d definitely gone through a bad time tonight. Had the fact they’d made a habit out of crying wolf gotten them killed? Or had the killer chosen them for some other reason—like being Drew Hawke’s girlfriend?
    “You think the Hawke conviction is solid?” he asked, testing the waters.
    If Erin’s teeth clenched any tighter together, her jaw would break. “It isn’t up to me to decide. I just provide evidence—”
    “Cut the bullshit, Erin. Do you think Hawke did it or not?”
    Her eyes flashed blue mercury. “Yes. Yes, I think he was guilty of raping those two women, and probably two other cases that weren’t prosecuted last year. But not because I have some vendetta against football players, which is what the papers keep spouting. It’s what the victims and the evidence told me.”
    DNA in the form of a hair, witness testimony, even polygraphs. The case had seemed solid, but he needed to look at every detail. Darsh turned away and played the music again. He lowered himself into Mandy’s rickety chair, ignoring the way it creaked under his weight. Then he turned to face the monitor with his fingers hovering over the keyboard. Would Mandy have heard someone coming through her bedroom door with her music this loud? Would she have seen his reflection in her screen?
    Or had the UNSUB burst in and quickly overpowered her, and then turned the music up to cover her screams? That didn’t make sense given there was another girl in the house—unless the other girl was already dead.
    He pressed “pause” again. “Walk up