Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 87913 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87913 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
When he’s done, he prints off a set of the ultrasound pictures and hands them to me before leaving Franny and me in the room alone.
“Are you okay?” she asks, and I drag my eyes off the black-and-white image in my hand and look at her across the room.
“I’m not sure. You?”
“I’m not sure either,” she admits. “Did you catch anything he said after the heartbeat?”
“Not one single word,” I reply with a smile, watching her laugh as she slides off the bed and slips on her sandals.
“Are you going back to work?” She grabs her purse while I open the door.
“Yeah, I have a meeting at three.” We step out of the room and start down the hall. “What are you doing tonight?”
“Nothing, just working on my current painting.” We stop at the checkout desk, where she needs to make her next appointment and pick up her prescription.
“How about I bring you dinner? I should be home by six, if that’s not too late.”
“Umm…” She licks her lips and looks up at me seeming to turn the offer over in her head. “Yeah, okay sure, that sounds good.”
“All right, text me when you get home.”
“Sure.” Her smile is small. “I’m really glad you came.”
Shit, why does my chest feel strange?
“Me too.” I reach out and rest my hand on her hip while I lean down and press a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“Okay,”
When I get down to my SUV, I sit there for a few minutes, trying to process everything that just happened. It’s too much to come to terms with in that short amount of time, but there are a couple of things I know for certain.
One: there is no way I want another man stepping up to raise my kid.
And two: Franny is going to fuck up my life in either the best or worst way possible.
CHAPTER 10
Dayton
“She was stabbed one hundred and four times,” Detective Burros says as I look through the photos he handed me. I’ve read that number in my case file numerous times, but hearing it again while looking at the crime scene photos makes me realize how much rage was involved in the murder of Alice Groden.
“She was caught off guard by the attack, and it wasn’t planned.” I lift my gaze to him, his partner, Detective Shaw, and the woman who has been sitting quietly at their side—Ms. Janelle Branch, the podcaster who came across the story of Alice Groden and shared it with her followers. She’s young, maybe twenty-five, and reminds me a little of Franny, with her dark-blonde hair, air of femininity, and glint of wisdom far beyond her years in her eyes.
“He might not have gone into her home with a weapon, but that doesn’t mean the attack wasn’t planned,” Janelle says softly, glancing over at Detective Burros. “He could have known she was there alone and gone over with the intent to rape her. We know he has a history of that.” Her eyes come to me. “During my investigation, I found out that Charles had been staying off and on with his brother, who lived across the street. He could have been watching her for a while and waiting for his moment to strike.”
“This isn’t a podcast,” Burros tells her, and she presses her lips together.
“I’m on the same page as Janelle,” Shaw says, then adds while ticking off on his fingers, “Nothing was taken from her apartment. Her purse was left untouched. There was money out on the counter left by Greg so Alice could go to the hair salon that afternoon. And she still had on all her jewelry. Her pants were undone, but she was still fully clothed. If he had tried to rape her and she started fighting and was getting away, he could have grabbed the closest thing he could get his hand on and used it as a weapon.”
The weapon he’s referring to is the knife that matched the ones that she and her husband had gotten as a wedding present just a few months prior. The handle was recovered from the scene, and the blade was later recovered from one of the wounds in Alice’s back, where it had broken off.
“And he knew that she would be able to identify him for attacking her, and he’d go to jail, so he couldn’t leave her alive,” Shaw concludes.
“Not that it would matter,” Janelle mutters.
“Don’t start that again,” Burros says, and Janelle rolls her eyes.
“What’s that about?” I ask, focusing on her.
Burros interrupts before she can answer for herself. “She thinks that the cops were covering for Charles because he was an informant.”
“What?” I look between the three of them.
“From what I was able to uncover, Charles had been working with the police. It’s why he was let off the hook with barely a slap on the wrist all the times he was arrested prior to the murder of Debra Oshae.”