Capitol Heights
10:00 a.m.
“You’re sure he isn’t home?” Asher asked. He had no desire to piss the guy off. The bastard would only take it out on his wife and then Asher would have to kick his ass.
“Tricia saw him leave for work,” Holt said. “Let’s go.”
They had enough on their plate already. Taking on the situation with Holt’s neighbors was something they really didn’t have the authority or the time to do right now. But Asher couldn’t say no when Holt asked. He climbed out of his Mustang and met Holt in front of the vehicle. Since she’d been at home when she called, he’d driven by and picked her up. The Sheltons lived a couple houses down from her. Holt and her wife heard them arguing all the time.
“So—” Asher walked up the sidewalk next to his sergeant “—since Tricia had the baby I guess that makes you the husband. Does that mean you’re usually the one on top when you have sex?”
Holt shot him a look. “Fuck you, Bauer.”
“No, really.” He kept time with her movements as they climbed the steps to the porch. “I’m just trying to wrap my head around the relationship.” He’d been giving Holt a hard time about her being gay since she and Tricia married. She had to know he was kidding around. Hell, he’d attended their wedding and bought their baby a hell of a gift card from Babies “R” Us.
Holt ignored his question and knocked on the door. While they waited for the lady of the house to answer, she glanced at him and muttered, “Asshole.”
Asher grinned. “But you love me anyway.”
Holt grunted a noncommittal response.
They both came to attention when the double dead bolts on the door snapped. The rattle of the security chain was next. All that to keep the bad guys out, when the real bad guy lived inside. Asher shook his head.
The door opened a narrow crack. “What do you want?”
The wife, Olivia. She sounded as small and afraid as she did each time they came to visit her. This time was different, though. None of the neighbors had called the police after hearing her scream or the asshole she’d married shouting profanities at her. This was the first time the baby who lived here wasn’t crying at the top of her lungs. This time was off the record.
“We know he left for work,” Holt said. “We’d like to talk to you for a few minutes.”
“The baby’s sleeping,” Olivia Shelton said, her voice shaking. “We’re fine. I don’t know who called you, but we’re fine. Y’all need to stop bothering us.”
“Let us come in and see for ourselves, Olivia, and we’ll be on our way,” Holt said, taking another tactic.
Shelton hesitated for a long moment, and then she relented. “Just don’t wake the baby.” She pulled the door open wider, staying in the shadows behind it.
Inside was dark. The blinds on the windows were drawn tight. The only light was in the hall that led to the three bedrooms. The smell of sausage and biscuits lingered in the air. Shelton had probably been up since dawn cooking and cleaning for the piece of shit grease monkey she’d married.
“What do you want?”
“We need you to turn on a light,” Holt insisted. “We can’t do this in the dark.”
It wasn’t completely dark, but damned close. Asher could make out the woman’s outline as she moved across the room and turned on a lamp. The dim glow did little to light up the room but it gave a clear picture of Shelton’s face before she could move away. Both eyes were swollen practically shut. Her lip was busted and turned inside out. Cheek was bruised.
Fury rushed through him. He wanted to kick her no-good husband’s ass. “When did he do this to you?”
She jumped. He hadn’t meant for the words to come out in a growl.
Holt held out a hand. “We’re here to help, Olivia. You’re not helping yourself or your child by protecting him.”
The damned woman refused to file charges against the bastard or to get a restraining order. She swore her blacked eyes and bruised face were her fault. She fell or walked into a door. Asher bit his lips together and kept his fists balled at his sides when he wanted to rail at her for being such a fool.
“He’s not a bad person.”
Asher rolled his eyes. What the fuck? “Will he be a bad person when you’re lying dead on the floor?”
She flinched.
Holt shot him a look.
He ignored her. “Listen to me,” he said to Shelton. “He’s going to kill you. That’s what guys like him do. You might not die today or tomorrow, but he will kill you. Could be as sudden as him slamming your head into something or could be as slow as breaking your nose and a few ribs, smashing your face over and over while you die a little bit more on the inside every day. Is that what you want for your daughter?” Asher nodded when she only stood there staring at him, her skinny bruised arms hugged around her body. “She’ll grow up seeing this and believe it’s normal. The next thing you know she’ll marry some guy who’ll do the same thing to her. Is that really what you want?”
Silence swelled in the room, growing bigger and bigger with each passing second. When another ten seconds elapsed and she didn’t say a word he shook his head. It was bad enough for the woman to live in this nightmare, but it was just plain fucking sickening for her to wish it on her kid.
“How can I stop him?”
Asher’s head came up. He and Holt shared a look.
“First,” Holt said, “we need you to take out a restraining order so he has to stay away from you and the baby. You should also press charges. Our hands are tied unless you take action.”
“They won’t try to take my baby from me?”
Asher wouldn’t touch that one.
“The truth is, Olivia,” Holt explained, “if you don’t do something they’re more likely to take your baby to protect her.”
“What do you mean?” Shelton drew back a step, her entire body trembling now.
“Police officers have an obligation to report these incidents to Child Services,” Holt said. “How many times has someone from Child Services been here already? It’s only a matter of time before they decide your decision to continue living in a home with an abusive man is a danger to your child.”
Tears spilled down her pale, bruised cheeks. “I told ’em I would never let him touch her.”
Asher restrained his frustration and went for the gentlest tone he could summon. “You won’t be able to stop him from hurting her any more than you can stop him from hurting you.”
“If I get a restraining order or press charges he’ll kill me,” she whispered, her voice desperate.
The three of them stood there in the crushing quiet once more. The woman wasn’t going to do the right thing. She was too afraid.
“Let us take you and the baby to a family shelter,” Holt offered. “Pack a few things and we’ll take you there right now. Then you can get a restraining order and go from there.”
Shelton looked from one to the other. “I...I can’t.”
The finality in her words reverberated in the silence that followed. There was nothing else they could do. Not legally, anyway.
“I need to see the baby,” Holt said, resignation settling in her tone. “You know the routine. I have to confirm she’s unharmed.”
Asher waited in the living room while Holt followed Shelton down the hall. Guys like Wesley Shelton should be dragged into the street and publicly beaten to death. How could a guy treat any woman—especially the woman he supposedly loved—like this? Sick bastard. One of these days he would get his. Asher just hoped he was around to see it.
Once Holt confirmed the baby was okay, she tried one last time to talk Shelton into going to a family shelter. She refused.
As they exited the dark house, the sun made Asher squint. The need for a drink nudged him but he pushed it away. He wasn’t going to fuck up his life with alcohol anymore. If he stayed on that doomed path he would be just as hopeless as Olivia Shelton.
“I was impressed by what you said to her,” Holt said as she settled into the passenger seat of his Mustang. “I’ve told her that before, but she didn’t listen. I’m hoping this time will be different.”
“She just needs to kill the son of a bitch and be done with it.”
Holt fired him a look. “I’m glad you didn’t say that kind of shit in there.”
Asher shrugged. “It’s the truth. You know he won’t stop until one or the other is dead. Have you ever seen one of these cases end any other way?”
Holt didn’t answer. Instead, she put through the call to Child Services for a follow-up visit to the Shelton home. Didn’t matter if she answered him or not. She knew he was right. You take a man that obsessed with a woman and that filled with violence, he wasn’t going to change.
Asher hoped Olivia Shelton realized that sad fact before it was too late.