Hacking Justice (Fractured Minds Series Book 5) Read online

  Hacking

  Justice

  FRACTURED MIND SERIES

  BOOK 5

  Kate Allenton

  Copyright © 2020 Kate Allenton

  All rights reserved.

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  This book is a work of fiction. Names, character, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or use fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work, in whole or in part, in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Coastal Escape Publishing

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 1

  I was many things, but a saint wasn’t one of them. As the casket was lowered into the ground, I fought the hot sting of tears gathering in my eyes while trying to keep my emotional breakdown from showing on my face. I was failing.

  The cemetery was crowded with Sloan’s friends, family, and coworkers. Cars lined the twisty road that led to his final resting place.

  Sloan’s ex-wife stood on the other side of the casket. Her head was lowered as she dabbed the tears from her eyes.

  She’d deserved Sloan. I never did.

  Why didn’t he ever see that?

  Pain seeped around the stitches in the wound on my chest. Anger stirred in my gut that I wasn’t the strong one today.

  Not in this damn wheelchair.

  I saved lives, damn it. Had I just figured out how I felt, I might have saved him too.

  I’d never know now.

  “You’ll get through this.” my sister, Gigi, rested a reassuring hand on my shoulder.

  “I know.”

  I lied. I’d never be okay again.

  If the son of a bitch who’d put the bomb under my car hadn’t already been dead, I’d kill him again, only this time slow and agonizing while he watched everyone he loved die first.

  Sloan deserved justice, and there was no way for me to administer it.

  “He was loved. He had a lot of friends,” Gigi whispered.

  I lowered my head as a tear slipped free, and my shoulders began to shake. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.

  I deserved as much.

  The pastor presiding over the proceedings closed with a prayer. I didn’t make an effort to move. I couldn’t take my eyes off Sloan’s casket as it rested at the bottom of the hole. A hole that had been caused by me. A hole that I should have been laying in the bottom of.

  “Take as long as you need,” Gigi said, stepping back.

  I couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. Not now.

  A black dress blocked my view. Sloan’s ex-wife, Janet, squatted in front of my wheelchair and met my gaze as tears slid down both of our faces.

  “He loved you, Lucy.”

  I nodded and swallowed hard around the lump in my throat. Loving me got him killed.

  “He loved you too, Janet,” I said.

  Janet nodded and swiped at her red, blotchy face as she rose and stepped out of view.

  I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t make nice; I couldn’t be nice when all I wanted to do was scream. My shoulders shook as the dam broke free. I couldn’t even be strong. Sloan had left me a shattered mess. Who was supposed to pick up the pieces now?

  The crowd slowly thinned until it was just me staring down into the hole where Sloan lay. I lost more than my sanity that day. I lost the one man who loved me more than I loved myself.

  ****

  Two months later, I snatched the mail from the mailbox and shoved my key into the door. Stepping inside, I dropped everything on the foyer table and walked into the kitchen. Grabbing a beer from the fridge, I popped the top and took a long cold draw, not stopping until the bottle was half empty.

  There was an abundance of evil in the world, and I hadn’t had to look far to find some to hunt. Working solo and stopping predators might have been a bit harder, but at least no one else would get hurt.

  Walking into my bedroom, I stepped toward the mirror. The cut above my eye was still bleeding, the bruise on my throat wouldn’t shut me up, and the death threats wouldn’t stop me. I was going to chase the scum of the earth either until I died or I found one that was smarter than me.

  I was doing things by myself like a damn psychotic private investigator. The clients didn’t care that I was psychotic, only that I produced results when the authorities couldn’t.

  I’d never get used to how my eyes had changed colors after surgery. Just like I may never get used to the voices mumbling in my head courtesy of the blood transfusions the hospital had administered during my surgery.

  I turned on the faucet, cupped my hands beneath the water, and ran it over my face. The water was cold and stung my cuts, but I didn’t care. I was still alive to feel the pain, unlike Sloan.

  The dull pain of a growing headache intensified as I struggled to block the voices, knowing what came next. I dropped onto the edge of the tub and covered my face, trying to breathe through the onslaught of different voices in my head. I clenched my eyes tight.

  A room appeared around me as I’d tapped into the effects of bonding with someone else’s blood. A television rested against one wall, the volume so loud it made me cringe.

  The apartment was beautiful and ritzy and looked as though it was decorated for a magazine. A woman in a red dress sat on a stool near the kitchen bar, her legs crossed, sipping wine.

  A man was also present. An uncanny calmness stirred in him, when I was used to tapping in to anger or fear. The man looked down and adjusted his cuffs. “I’m glad you could make it, Sylvia.”

  I threw up my barrier, erecting a mental block, imagining building the wall brick by brick until there was nothing left for me to see.

  My eyes shot open, and the visions vanished as I tried to catch my breath. I grabbed the sink and pulled myself to stand. Would this every go away? Would I ever have my life back?

  “That could have been so much worse,” I whispered as I s
tared into the mirror again. Drops of blood slid down my face over my cheek from the cut above my eye. I swiped at the crimson trail with a rag then slipped a bandage over the wound.

  Before I could give much more thought to the man in my head, my doorbell rang.

  I ignored it.

  There wasn’t a soul that I needed to talk to. Not one I cared to deal with.

  I was going through the daily motions of learning how to shut myself off even if I couldn’t quiet the persistent mumbles in my head.

  The ringing stopped, and I heard the unmistakable sound of a deadbolt unlocking. Grabbing my gun from the bedside table, I marched down the hall and pointed it in the direction of whoever was brave enough to open my door.

  I cocked the hammer with my finger on the trigger, ready to deal with whatever evil had followed me home and was picking my locks.

  The door slowly opened, and I tilted my head.

  Chapter 2

  “Don’t shoot me,” Ford said from my front stoop.

  I sighed and lowered my weapon. “If you don’t want to be shot, then you shouldn’t be breaking into my house.”

  Ford stepped into the foyer, shutting the door behind him. It had been two months since he’d tried to talk to me at the funeral. Two months since I’d broken things off with the entire team. Ford had suggested I needed a break in our work, whereas Noah suggested I needed to press on.

  I guess they were both right.

  “You look like shit,” Ford said, following me back into the kitchen where the rest of my beer was waiting.

  “Thanks. What do you want?” I ignored the sudden sting that came with lifting my cut brow.

  “You were always kind of grumpy before, and I can see that time hasn’t changed that.”

  The beer bottle clunked when I tossed it into the trash. I grabbed two more, and handed him one. “You should have called. I could have saved you the trip.”

  Ford ignored the beer and crossed his arms over his chest. “You’re killing yourself.”

  My eyes narrowed. “And that affects you how?”

  “I care about you,” he said, taking a step in my direction.

  I held up my hand and shook my head.

  “Sloan would be pissed to see how you’re handling his death. He’d be the first one to call you on your shit.”

  “Yeah, well, unless he’s learned to talk from the grave, I think I’m safe from his verbal reprimand.”

  “This isn’t you,” Ford said, frustration tight in his voice.

  “If you don’t like it, you can leave,” I said, gesturing toward the door.

  There was a silence between us. He stared at me as if silently trying to decide which one of us was more stubborn.

  I’d win every time.

  “You still hear the voices?” he asked. His question was more like a statement.

  I was doing more than hearing the voices thanks to the blood transfusion. I was seeing things too.

  “Why the hell are you here?” I growled, walking out of the kitchen and into my living room.

  Ford followed me, and his gaze landed on the pizza boxes and empty beer bottles. I didn’t care what he thought of me or how I lived. I only cared that he left.

  “Noah needs you,” Ford answered.

  I licked my lips and shook my head quickly. “I can’t.”

  “You already are,” Ford said, gesturing at my battered face. “Unless you joined a fight club and that’s how you got those bruises and cuts, then you’re doing something you shouldn’t be…especially without backup.”

  “I work alone now,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “That’s all you need to know, so tell Noah I’m busy.”

  “Lucy…”

  “Ford, just leave.”

  Ford slid his suit jacket off and tossed it over the nearest chair. “Afraid I can’t do that. I’m not abandoning you. You’ve had time to grieve, and I’m not going to let you die alone in this house.”

  My nostrils flared. “I never signed the contract that Noah brought. I don’t owe him anything, and I damn sure don’t owe you anything.”

  “No, you don’t,” he said, loosening his tie. “You don’t owe anyone anything. I agree.” Ford pulled pictures from inside his jacket pocket and shoved them against my chest as he passed.

  He stacked the empty pizza boxes and carried them out to the kitchen as I stared down at the pictures. A man dressed in a three-piece suit stared back at me. A woman wearing a floral dress. Another woman in a police uniform.

  “Am I supposed to be feeling something?” I called out and dropped the pictures onto my coffee table.

  Ford returned from the kitchen with a trash bag in his hand. “Feeling something? No, but now you have faces to go with those voices starting to tune in inside your head.”

  My gaze snapped down to the pictures, and I picked up the one of the suit guy again. It was the man who’d been in my head. “Where did you get those?”

  “Sam hacked the blood bank and your hospital records. He figured you might want to get acquainted with the newly acquired blood flowing in your body.”

  I slowly sat on the couch and stared at the pictures. The visions were few and far between, and the voices were most of the time mumbled tones. I’d learned to block the visions by building my brick wall, but sometimes I wasn’t fast enough. Sometimes I saw and intruded on private moments that made me feel like a voyeur. I was unable to block those when I was asleep. The only way to eradicate the unwanted noise was if either them or I were to die.

  I swallowed hard.

  “Sam can tell you everything you need to know about them,” Ford said on his way out the door with my trash.

  “He shouldn’t haven’t hacked the records. Not for me,” I said when Ford walked back inside empty-handed.

  Ford sat on the chair across from me, his gaze determined. “He misses you, Lucy. We all do, but especially Sam. He’s like a lost puppy without you.”

  “Ford…” I clenched my fists, driving my nails into my palms. “I can’t. Not anymore.”

  “You think you were the only one to lose something that day, Lucy?” Ford growled. “Our dynamics changed that day. You were the glue that held us together, and then you up and quit. Without notice, without conversation, you were just done and out of our lives.”

  I rose from my seat. “I’m the reason Sloan isn’t here. I’m the reason he died. It was my damn car, and he’d showed up because he was worried about me.”

  Ford’s jaw hardened. “This is a classic case of survivor’s guilt, Lucy. You’re a psychologist; you should recognize the symptoms. You need to work through this. I’ll help you. We all will, but we need you to deal with this and come back before you get yourself killed.”

  “I can’t. I won’t be the reason someone else dies. I just can’t.”

  Ford sighed as he stood and crossed the room. He rested his hand in my hair and leaned forward, pressing a kiss to my forehead. His lips lingered, and I closed my eyes, trying to banish the memory of Sloan’s death from my mind. It didn’t work.

  “I promised him that I’d back off if he helped me find you in those woods. I needed you to be okay.” Ford pulled back and stared down into my eyes. “We both needed you to be okay. Sloan may be gone, Lucy, but I’m still here, and I need you to be okay.” He rested his forehead against mine. “If you need someone to blame, then blame me. That’s fine, but at least text Sam and let him know you’re okay. He’s been worried sick about you.”

  I nodded. “I will.”

  Ford pulled away, grabbed his jacket, and headed for the door. He pulled it open and turned back to look at me once more. “This is just a reprieve, Lucy. I’m not going away, not until you’re better.”

  I sucked in a breath fighting the tears when he pulled the door shut. “I’ll never be better.”

  I plopped down onto the couch and stared around my messy living room.

  “Give the guy a break. He loves you, and you aren’t easy to love.” I heard Sloan’s vo
ice as if here sitting right next to me and whispered it into my ear instead of hovering near the far wall.

  Sloan’s amused stare cut bone-deep.

  I blinked, and he was gone.

  It wasn’t the first time he’d visited me and it probably wouldn’t be the last.

  The first time it happened I began to question my sanity, but when another spirit showed up, it was no longer a question of if I belonged in a loony bin, but if someone would find out and have me committed.

  My bad choices were coming back to haunt me.

  “They stay alive this way,” I said, rising from my seat. I picked up the empty beer bottles and walked through the same spot where Sloan had been standing. The air temperature in that spot had dropped ten degrees and brought goosebumps to my arms.

  Chapter 3

  I should have moved and changed the locks. My house turned into Grand Central after Ford’s visit, but no matter who showed up, I still didn’t care.

  A knock sounded on my front door followed by Gigi calling my name, her voice barely muffled by the heavy oak.

  “I know you’re in there. Let me in.” Gigi and I were twins. We both had that spidey-sense when the other was in trouble. She said hers was working overtime thanks to me.

  I pulled the door open to find her standing on my stoop juggling two bags of groceries.

  “Don’t be rude, grab a bag,” she said, shoving one of the bags into my arms as she pushed past me and paused just inside the door. “Oh, this won’t do.”

  “My maid has the day off,” I grabbed the other bag from her hand and headed to the kitchen.

  “You don’t have a maid, but you sure need one,” she called after me.

  Gigi meant well and wouldn’t leave until I physically picked her up and carried her out the door.

  “You’ve got company coming tonight.”

  “No, no, I don’t,” I answered back, pulling out the fixings to make lasagna. “You better call it off, or I might accidentally shoot someone.”

  “They know to wear their bulletproof vests, Lucy Loo,” she said in that sweet voice she reserved to piss me off.