Baltimore [3.5] Broken Silence by Karen Rose Page A

and navigate the hallway to the homicide department.
    Normally it took her half as much time. Then again, people didn’t normally stop her every other minute to tell her how good it was to see her back. Which was because she’d never been gone before. Since joining the prosecutors’ office a few years before, she’d rarely taken a vacation and even then she’d never been gone more than a few days. Certainly not two weeks.
    At least no one had asked for details. Or told her they were ‘sorry for her loss.’ She wasn’t sure she could handle either questions or condolences today.
    The crimes they’d uncovered two weeks ago . . . Daphne didn’t want to see the photos they’d found, not ever again. Not that she needed the pictures. She could see every one of the victims’ faces in her mind. Frightened, alone, in pain. Murdered and buried haphazardly behind a cabin in the West Virginia mountains. Two dozen unmarked graves. I’m so sorry .
    And then there was the one body the killer had buried but not photographed. But she didn’t need his picture either. Her own father’s face was forever etched in her memory. She grieved his death, her mother’s broken heart. She grieved for the lives the three of them should have lived. I’m sorry, Daddy .
    But she hadn’t been to blame. She’d been a child. A victim herself. She knew that. Knew it in her head anyway. It was her damn heart that was having a hard time keeping up.
    ‘Daphne? Are you okay?’
    She blinked, realizing she stood at the double doors to the homicide department, her hand tightened into a death grip on the door handle. Pasting a serene smile on her face, she looked up to find Detective JD Fitzpatrick coming out the other door, his eyes narrowed in concern.
    ‘I’m fine.’ More than a colleague, JD was a friend – one who knew her well enough to know she was lying through her teeth, but who cared enough not to call her on it. ‘How are Lucy and the baby?’ she asked, changing the subject, and he grinned, his happiness infectious.
    ‘Both doing great. We wish the baby would sleep a little more, but otherwise he’s perfect.’
    Her smile was real this time. ‘Trust me, he’ll be a teenager sleeping till noon before you know it. Seems like just yesterday Ford was a newborn.’ Her son was twenty now. And alive . She couldn’t let herself think about how close she’d come to losing him.
    ‘Jeremiah’s already growing too fast as it is. Don’t make him a teenager yet. Please.’ He checked his watch with an apologetic wince. ‘I have to run. They’re letting Stevie out of the hospital today and I’m taking her home.’
    Daphne’s heart lightened. ‘Oh, I’m so glad.’ The recovery of Detective Stevie Mazzetti, one of the victims of the violence that had changed their lives forever, was cause for celebration for everyone who knew her. But for Daphne, the news was especially profound. Stevie had been shot saving Daphne’s life, a debt Daphne could never repay. That Stevie would never expect her to made her sacrifice all the more meaningful. ‘Tell her I’ll bring muffins when she’s settled.’
    ‘She’ll like that.’ JD’s eyes went sly. ‘Lucy likes muffins, too. You might come by to see the baby and bring her some. And if you put in a few extra for me, I’d make myself eat them.’
    She laughed and swatted his arm. ‘Go. Tell your wife I’ll visit her soon too.’
    ‘I will. Now that you’re back, I have some cases to cover with you. See you later.’
    ‘But I’m not – ’
    JD was already gone, off like a shot, headed for the elevator before she could tell him she wasn’t really back. Not yet.
    Daphne hadn’t dared approach her own desk in the prosecutors’ offices today. The last time she’d tried, she’d been turned away a foot inside the front door by a well-informed and dutiful receptionist. Her boss, Senior Assistant State’s Attorney Grayson Smith, had made it known that she wasn’t to show her face there