Just Keep Sweet (The Compound Series) Read online

  JUST KEEP SWEET

  The Compound Series, Book 3

  A novel by Melissa Brown

  Kindle Edition

  Copyright © 2016 by Melissa Brown

  All Rights Reserved

  Edited by Hollie Westring

  Cover Design & Photography by Regina Wamba, Mae I Design & Photography

  Formatting by Integrity Formatting

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the above author of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  A Note from the Author

  The expansive compound of "Short Creek" is located in both Hildale, Utah and Colorado City, Arizona, so you will see references to both locations in this series.

  Thanks so much for reading!

  Table of Contents

  Part One

  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

  Part Two

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  About the Author

  Also by Melissa Brown

  Chapter 1

  She’s a moron. An absolute moron.

  Leaning back in my seat, listening to another trite story from my dumb-as-a-box-of-fucking-rocks companion, I did my best to hide my boredom, but that was never one of my talents.

  Tracking down criminals? Yep.

  Interrogating perps? Again, yes.

  Suffering through a dull blind date with a woman who looked nothing at all like her picture on the website? Nope. In the photo she had long, curly blond hair, but in person I was surprised to see short hair that didn’t even touch her shoulders. Her skin was splotchy, and she’d definitely gained at least fifty pounds since the photo was taken. Of course, I really wanted to call bullshit, but I knew that would be exceptionally bad form. The best I could do was get through the next hour of dull conversation, say good night, and delete my account from the ridiculous excuse for a dating site my ex-wife insisted I join.

  Yep, my ex-wife, Elizabeth, was my best friend. And yes, I knew how odd that was. In fact, it was the best woman repellant I could come up with, so I used it on several blind dates the last year. And I had a feeling I’d be busting it out that evening as well. I needed the right segue.

  “You haven’t touched your food,” Montana said, talking with a mouth full of salmon.

  Yes, her name is Montana. I can’t make this shit up.

  “Late lunch.” I shrugged, offering her the best polite smile I could muster.

  “So,” she began, placing one elbow on the table and tilting her round face as her chin rested in her open hand. “Do you have one of those thingies? You know, that you wear on one eye?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  What the hell is this crazy bitch talking about? I really need to get the check. Where is that waitress?

  “You know, it’s like glasses but just for one eye. You said you’re a detective. Don’t you have one of those?”

  Moron.

  “Do you mean a monocle?” My annoyance allowed me to hold in a laugh that wanted to explode from my lungs.

  “Yes!” She looked excited, bouncing a bit in her seat. “One of those!”

  “I think you mean a magnifying glass.” I leaned my head toward her, waiting for her to make the connection.

  Come on, Montana, work with me here.

  “No, no.” She shook her head, her plump cheeks flaring a deep red, and reached into her purse to retrieve her phone. “I’ll show you.”

  With a satisfied smirk, she passed her phone and I stared at the screen. A cartoon detective with a brown trench coat, Sherlock Holmes cap, and a large magnifying glass.

  “See, it’s in his hand.”

  Not having the energy to argue with my date, I passed the phone back to her with my lips pressed together in a thin line. I nodded with strained courtesy, and locked eyes with the waitress, signaling for her to bring the check.

  “Want to come back to my place?” Montana asked, licking her lips as she held her keys in her hand, standing next to her car door.

  “Uh, ya know, I have to be at the station early tomorrow.”

  “On a Sunday?”

  “Crime never sleeps. Maybe another time.”

  “Oh.” She nodded, looking down at the clinking keys in her palm. “Okay, thanks again for dinner.”

  “No problem.”

  If I’d been the least bit attracted to Montana, I may have considered her offer. It wasn’t as if I was some celibate ass waiting for the right woman. Hell, I’d slept with several women from the dating site during the past few months. But I had standards, and one of those was a working brain.

  Good night, Montana. Best of luck to you.

  Hours later, I was back at home, lying in bed watching old Seinfeld reruns. I’d already withstood the interrogation from Elizabeth, urging me to be less picky and to give these women a chance, yada yada yada.

  Obviously I’m watching too much Seinfeld.

  “Jon, I’m serious. You need to ease up on these women. It’s tough out there.”

  “Not for you.”

  She sighed into the phone. Elizabeth had moved on with a guy named Francis. I had quite the field day with his name, but on the whole he was a good guy who tolerated the friendship between his fiancée and me.

  “I got lucky, you know that.”

  “Whatever. Maybe I like being by myself. You ever think of that? Maybe I’m a lone wolf.”

  “Give it a rest. We both know you’re lonely, just admit it.”

  She was right. I was lonely; I had found it hard to move on after we divorced three years prior.

  We were never like other couples, even in the beginning. She was a temp at the station answering phones and making coffee and since I was there twelve hours a day, it seemed only natural to ask her out. She was cute enough, and I liked her personality. There wasn’t some ridiculous thunderbolt of lust, some overwhelming need to be with one another 24/7. Nope, we just got each other. So, we dated for three years, were married for eight, until the random Wednesday evening when she turned off the television and told me we needed to talk, which is something a guy never wants to hear.

  “I want passion,” she’d said. “Someone who wants me so badly he can barely see straight. And that’s not you, Jonathan. I’m not sure it ever was.”

  “What are you talking about?” I was confused, shocked. “What we have is great. You’re my best friend, E.”

  “And you’re mine. But this isn’t working—it’s a friendship, not a mar
riage.”

  And that was that. She moved out two weeks later, and we’d been best friends ever since.

  “I’m not lonely, E. Drop it, all right? Work’s just been busy. I’ve got this new case and it’s . . . it’s pretty extreme.”

  “Wanna talk about it?”

  “Naw, I should really go to sleep.”

  “Fine, I get it.” She laughed. “I’ll talk to you later this week, ‘kay?”

  “Yep.”

  Thoughts of the case rambled through my brain as I attempted to sleep. Aspen Black was a bold and determined wife of the FLDS and as much as I hated that sham of a cult, I couldn’t pass her case on to someone else. I wanted to help her and her children. Lord knew if I didn’t, it would remain on my conscience for the rest of my life.

  She wasn’t like the other FLDS women I’d come in contact with in Colorado City. “Shy” didn’t begin to cover it. Most of them wouldn’t even make eye contact with normal guys. They’d shush their children and scurry away if you offered them so much as a “Good morning.” Poor, brainwashed women with long braids and starchy cotton dresses that covered every square inch of skin possible.

  Aspen had the braid and she had the dress, but nothing else about her was the same as those other women. She was confident, resolute, and daring. And despite her devout nature, she wasn’t afraid to go up against someone as powerful as her prophet if it meant saving her children from his clutches. I admired that. Hell, I admired her. Never thought I’d say that about a member of the freaking FLDS.

  With my hand behind my head, I stared up at my ceiling fan, wondering where she was. And as if some grand force of nature connected us (which is something I definitely don’t believe in whatsoever), my cell phone rang. I jumped to attention, placing my glasses on and sitting up in bed.

  “Yeah,” I answered.

  Her voice was strained. “I have it . . . I have proof.”

  “What did you find?”

  “It’s disturbing. I took pictures. I’ll show you when I get there. Can I come to your house?”

  Aspen? In my apartment? It must be really horrific for her to leave the compound.

  I closed my eyes tight, running my fingers through my hair. “Now? It’s one o’clock in the morning, Aspen.”

  “It can’t wait! You have to see—” Her voice cracked before she was silent. The tension that hung in the air killed me. I had to help her.

  “Of course. I’ll pick you up. Go to the corner of Ridge and Canyon Street, and I’ll be there waiting, all right? I don’t live nearby, and I don’t want you walking alone at this time of night.”

  “Fine. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Okay, be safe.”

  “I will.”

  “Little House?” I said before hanging up, using my nickname for her. Initially it was said in snark, a flippant pop culture reference that I knew she’d never quite comprehend. Now it was a term of endearment.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m proud of you.”

  Once back at my apartment, Aspen told me about what she’d found in the old temple: a creepy-assed bed in a room attached to a classroom. Bile rose in my throat as my imagination ran wild. She found condoms, K-Y, plastic sheets, and duct tape.

  You twisted fuck.

  Even with her sheltered existence, Aspen knew as well as I did that only something evil and abusive was happening inside that room. But to whom? As we continued to discuss her discoveries at the temple, she retrieved a ledger from her bag, and panic consumed me. No court of law in the state of Arizona would approve a stolen ledger as evidence—especially not one that was handwritten. Knowing the diabolical nature of Clarence Black, I was certain he’d use the money from these horrific transactions to pay for the best defense attorney money could buy . . . and that ledger, which held the key to this case, would be thrown out.

  I raised my voice and regretted it immediately. Clearly Aspen didn’t realize she was supposed to simply take pictures—she was trying to help, to put this fucker behind bars. But now . . . well, now we had to figure out how to get it back inside the temple.

  My phone rang, and I wondered who in the hell could possibly be calling me. When I looked at the screen of my phone and saw “LITTLE HOUSE” staring back at me, adrenaline plunged through my stomach.

  “Aspen, where’s your phone?” I demanded.

  “What?” She tilted her head to the side, confused.

  “The call. It’s coming from your phone. Did you accidentally dial me?”

  She dug through her bag, pulling it this way and that, but looked at me in horror after several seconds of frantic searching.

  “It’s gone!”

  She jumped to her feet and ran to stand beside me. Together, we stared down at the screen until Aspen shrieked.

  “Oh no, I-I left it on his . . . oh no, Jonathan! It’s him, it’s the prophet!”

  With a sneer, I answered the call. “Who is this?”

  I heard nothing at first, but then breathing. In and out, I heard the caller breathe into the phone, and it made my fucking skin crawl. My eyes widened as I waited for the prophet to speak, but he didn’t. He just kept breathing. Aspen looked desperate to understand what was happening, so I placed the phone to her ear. Horror crossed her face as she listened for several seconds, then she handed the phone back to me.

  “It was the prophet; it had to be.”

  I nodded. “Without a doubt.”

  “Did he say anything to you when you first picked up?”

  I shook my head. “No. He just breathed into it. Creepiest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  Aspen swallowed hard. “He knows.”

  “And he has your phone.”

  “And the pictures. He knows what I found upstairs.”

  I nodded again. “The proof we needed, it’s gone.”

  Aspen paced the room. “But why didn’t he say anything? I don’t understand.”

  “To cover his ass.”

  “I still don’t get it. He called the number, he made contact—why not speak?”

  I crossed my arms. “He didn’t have to. He sent a message without saying a fucking word. And we received it loud and clear, didn’t we?”

  “Yes, we did.”

  Chapter 2

  “Cooke.” The sharp sound of Sergeant Ross’s deep voice snapped me from my Aspen-induced haze. With a start, I pulled my elbows from my desk and sat at attention, opening my eyes wide and breathing in deeply.

  “Yeah.”

  With one hand against the doorframe and the other on his hip, he glared at me with obvious annoyance. “My office, two minutes.”

  I swallowed hard. “Yes, sir.”

  It took every bit of self-restraint I had to drop Aspen at her house the night before. I’ll never forget the look on her expressive face when she realized what was happening, when the prophet called my phone from hers.

  Sheer terror.

  Every ounce of color drained from her skin, her already stormy eyes bulged, and her entire body stiffened. She was scared out of her mind, and it killed me to see her like that. In fact, I wanted to drive to the compound that very minute and kill the diabolical son of a bitch.

  Criminals were my business. Day in and day out I tracked them down, acquired evidence, and built cases against them. It’s what I do—and I’m damn good at it. I’d seen it all—murderers, rapists, child molesters—sick fucks who didn’t deserve the air they breathed. But no one . . . not one had creeped me out the way Clarence Black did. Power corrupts—history has proved this time and again. Hateful, murderous dictators destroy lives without a drop of remorse. It’s how they get off. And with all that I know about the sick bastards of the world, the self-proclaimed “prophet” got off on the misery of those he controlled.

  He craved it.

  He relished the control he had over thousands of lives . . . innocent, trusting people who would do just about anything to be in his good graces.

  He made my blood boil.

  Aspen
was bound and determined to take him down, and I’d do just about anything to help her while still following the law. But if I was honest with myself, I wasn’t sure it was possible, even with the evidence she gathered at the temple. The most likely, inadmissible evidence, depending on whatever judge was assigned to the case . . . that is, if we could build a case against the fucker. Since he had her phone and all the photographs stored on it, this ledger was our saving grace—our shred of a chance to bring him down for his crimes.

  But what exactly were his crimes?

  Aspen and I didn’t know for sure. We knew he was being paid by gentiles, and we were pretty certain those same gentiles were engaging in (or simply watching) nonconsensual sex with someone inside the temple walls. But who? Other gentiles? The prophet’s young wives? Children of the compound who the prophet had groomed to not tell a soul? That last thought caused a chill to run down my spine, but the truth was, we had to be prepared for anything. And knowing the twisted mind we were dealing with, the answer wouldn’t be pretty. In fact, chances were it would be beyond fucked up.

  I barely slept the last two nights and spent my (normally coveted) Sunday pacing my apartment and downing cup after cup of coffee. I was worried about Aspen and her children and when I heard nothing from her, I feared the worst.

  The absolute worst. And it freaked the hell out of me.

  Since arriving at work on this unwelcome Monday morning, I’d stared at the wall, hoping she’d call, hoping she was safe and that her kids were okay. I couldn’t focus on anything else but her well-being, and clearly my boss took notice.

  When I arrived at his office, I waited for his acknowledgment, but his back was to me as he stared out the window, yelling on his cell phone.

  “And how is that an emergency on my part? You call and expect me to drop everything. It doesn’t work like that.”

  He paused, turning to face me and waving me in.

  “Whatever, fine. Listen, I’ll speak to you later. Some of us have to work. Yeah, I bet you will. Goodbye.”

  With a grimace, I offered an awkward smile, knowing this wouldn’t be a pleasant conversation. The least I could do was break the ice. “The ex?”