Introduction

IN EILEEN CARR'S HEART-POUNDING ROMANTIC SUSPENSE DEBUT, AN UNSPEAKABLE CRIME WITH A MYSTERIOUS TWIST IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.... SHE' S NO STRANGER TO THE DARKEST PLACES IN THE HUMAN MIND... Devoted to her troubled clients, clinical psychologist Aimee Gannon never thought she'd be entangled in a murder investigation. But a middle-of-the-night phone call from the Sacramento PD delivers a shock: Aimee's rebellious seventeen-year-old patient Taylor Dawkin could be a suspect in the gruesome murder of her own parents. Traumatized by the events of that fatal night, Taylor is left catatonic...and Aimee is desperate to reach beyond her silence to uncover the truth. BUT HE' S SEEN THE EVIDENCE FIRSTHAND... Detective Josh Wolf needs Aimee's help to decipher the clues behind a pattern of rectangles and circles that Taylor drew in blood at the crime scene. Unfortunately, he can't keep his mind off the beautiful psychologist -- those long legs, that irritating stubborn streak. But he can't afford a moment's distraction: After Aimee is attacked, she and Josh must race to uncover Taylor's terrifying secret...before the deadly shadows of the past strike again.

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Excerpt

Hold Back the Dark

by Eileen Carr

Chapter One

Phone calls at two a.m. were never good news. So when Aimee Gannon’s cell phone rang, vibrating its way across the bedside table early Tuesday morning, she woke with a knot in her chest.

She’d been swimming at the edge of a nightmare, getting caught in its currents and then fighting her way clear, never quite waking but not resting, either. It was almost a relief to be woken by the call. She groped for the phone. As she struggled upright, Aimee flipped the phone open. "This is Dr. Gannon."

"Dr. Gannon, this is Detective Josh Wolf of the Sacramento Police Department."

The police? "What can I do for you, Detective?" Aimee swung her feet over the side of the bed onto the cool wood floor. Why the hell were the cops calling her in the middle of the night? She stretched her shoulders, trying unkink her neck and readying herself to find out who was in trouble and why.

"I think I have one of your patients in custody and I was hoping you could come help us with her. She’s . . . uncooperative at present," the man said, his deep voice crackling over the cellular connection.

Uncooperative plus custody definitely equaled trouble. Janelle, maybe? She was an angry drunk, and altercations at bars often led to police custody. Or maybe Gary, her sex addict, had been picked up in a prostitution sting? Wait – the detective said "she."

"Who are you talking about, Detective?" Aimee rubbed some of the sleep from her eyes.

"The girls name is Taylor Dawkin," Wolf said.

Aimee sat upright. "Taylor? In custody?" Crap. Taylor had plenty of problems, but Aimee felt they were making progress. Big progress.

"Can you come?" Wolf asked, ignoring her question. "She’s at Mercy General."

"Why is she at the hospital? Has she been hurt?" Aimee tucked the phone against her shoulder and grabbed a pair of jeans out of the dresser.

"I’d prefer to explain things in person," Wolf said, his staticky voice hard to read.

Shit. This guy was going to give her zero information. "Are her parents already there? Can I speak to them?" Taylor was only seventeen. Her relationship with Orrin and Stacey was everything ugly that a teenage girl’s could be, but they would certainly be at the hospital with her.

There was a pause at the other end. "That not an option at the moment. I can send a squad car for you. Someone could be there in ten minutes."

Aimee froze for a second. Not an option – what the hell did that mean? "Has Taylor done something? Is she under arrest?"

Another pause. "I’d really prefer to explain in person." Wolf’s impatience was clear despite the bad connection. "Shall I have an officer pick you up?"

"I can get myself there, Detective," Aimee said curtly, fishing a tank top from a drawer. Impatience was a two-way street. "Give my thirty-five minutes." She snapped the phone shut.

The bright bathroom lights hurt her eyes when she snapped them on and their faint electronic hum made the muscles of her neck tense up. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail, quickly brushed her teeth, then threw a jean jacket on over her tank top and hoodie. It had been in the sixties that afternoon, but the night would be cool ad the hospital would be freezing.

Aimee took a deep breath at her front door. She hated the anxiety that formed in the pit of her stomach at the thought of walking through the parking garage alone in the middle of the night, but Taylor needed her. Push through it. You’re bigger than the fear.

She locked the condo and took the elevator down to the parking garage. Even wearing sneakers, her footsteps echoed in the deserted garage. The harsh lights cast stark shadows that seemed to leap out, and the low ceiling felt like it was pressing down on her. Checking behind her, she pressed the keyless entry and her Subaru gave a welcoming double beep. She got in and locked the door as fast as she could, then stopped and made herself breathe. The locked secure garage was part of why she’d bought the condo after she and Danny had split up. She was safe here.

Still, as she drove up 18th Street to J and then headed east, she shivered as she drove past all the darkened houses. She reminded herself that her problems were much smaller than whatever had landed an already traumatized teenaged girl in the hospital with no one but the police looking after her.

Aimee pushed the gas pedal a little harder toward the floor.

Detective Josh Wolf closed his cell. The shrink didn’t sound delighted at being woken up in the middle of the night, but at least she was coming. It was a straw to grasp at, and he didn’t have much else. Who could have done this? And why?

He stared down at the two bodies that lay on the floor, hands duct-taped behind their backs and more duct tape covering their mouths. The back of the man’s head had been bashed in, most likely with the blood-covered lamp lying next to him. The woman had clearly been strangled. He didn’t know what had been used to choke the life out of the slightly overweight blonde with the gray roots; the murderer hadn’t left that behind. A souvenir, or something incriminating? He ran his hand over his face. It was going to be a very long night.

Camera flashes strobed the living room, making it even more macabre as the crime scene technicians and photographers tried to find anything and everything that could possible point to who had done this. The place was covered with fingerprints and blood. The driveway was a road map of tire tracks. An empty wine bottle had been smashed. A pile of cigarette butts was mounded in the bushes outside the front door, a puddle of vomit nearby. Footprints abounded. Sorting through and tracking down the possible leads could keep him and Elise busy for weeks. His best lead was the girl, and she was in no shape to lead anywhere.

"Nice place." Elise Jacobs, Josh’s partner looked around the large living room.

She was right. Even with the bottom falling out of California real estate, this place would be worth a pile of dough. Great neighborhood in the Pocket, the little U-shaped section of Sacramento that jutted out into the river from the west side of I-5. A well-tended half-Tudor on a big lot with a pool in back. The kitchen was all stainless steel and granite, and an entire family could live in one of the bathrooms. They didn’t build places like this anymore. Josh had a cousin who was a contractor, and he knew this place must have cost a mint.

"Call me crazy, but I’m not sure I like what they’ve done to the place." Josh gave Elise a wry smile. Not many other people appreciated his gallows humor.

"I now what you mean," she replied and they both turned to look at the smears of blood covering the living room walls. "Someone spent some time on that, but it is so not a good thing."

"True that," Josh replied. A series of geometric figures covered the walls, the same pattern again and again: a long low rectangle divided in three, a circle, then another long low rectangle divided in three.

"Any idea what it means?" Elise stepped closer on her plastic-covered feet.

"Not a damn clue," Josh moved up to peer more closely at the blood-smeared walls. Was it a message? From the killer? It wouldn’t be the first time that a killer had left messages to taunt the police. Josh had seen Zodiac, and that was based on a real case and one pretty close to home.

Elise shook her head and turned away from the wall as if to dismiss it from her mind. "They figure out what to do with the girl yet?"

"They’ve got her at the ER at Mercy with a guard. They already had two gunshot wounds at the ER at UC-Davis, and she didn’t need a level one trauma center. At least I didn’t think so. Hard to tell."

Until they figured out whether the girl they’d found covered with blood, mumbling incoherently, and rocking herself violently needed a victim’s advocate or a lawyer. Or both. view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

1. What are the various ways that different characters deal with the violence that has interrupted their lives? Which ways are effective? Why?
2. What makes one person able to rise above a situation and another in the same situation unable to do so? What factors of background or temperament might play a role?
3. When a person commits a crime, does it matter why they did it? Can there be a good enough reason to hurt another person?

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