The Perfect Block

Blake Pierce is author of the bestselling RILEY PAGE mystery series, which includes fifteen books (and counting). Blake Pierce is also the author of the MACKENZIE WHITE mystery series, comprising nine books (and counting); of the AVERY BLACK mystery series, comprising six books; of the KERI LOCKE mystery series, comprising five books; of the MAKING OF RILEY PAIGE mystery series, comprising three books (and counting); of the KATE WISE mystery series, comprising two books (and counting); of the CHLOE FINE psychological suspense mystery, comprising three books (and counting); and of the JESSE HUNT psychological suspense thriller series, comprising three books (and counting).

An avid reader and lifelong fan of the mystery and thriller genres, Blake loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.blakepierceauthor.com to learn more and stay in touch.

Copyright © 2018 by Blake Pierce. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the author. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Jacket image Copyright hurricanehank, used under license from Shutterstock.com.

A JESSIE HUNT PSYCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE SERIES

THE PERFECT WIFE (Book #1)

THE PERFECT BLOCK (Book #2)

THE PERFECT HOUSE (Book #3)

CHLOE FINE PSYCHOLOGICAL SUSPENSE SERIES

NEXT DOOR (Book #1)

A NEIGHBOR’S LIE (Book #2)

CUL DE SAC (Book #3)

KATE WISE MYSTERY SERIES

IF SHE KNEW (Book #1)

IF SHE SAW (Book #2)

IF SHE RAN (Book #3)

THE MAKING OF RILEY PAIGE SERIES

WATCHING (Book #1)

WAITING (Book #2)

LURING (Book #3)

RILEY PAIGE MYSTERY SERIES

ONCE GONE (Book #1)

ONCE TAKEN (Book #2)

ONCE CRAVED (Book #3)

ONCE LURED (Book #4)

ONCE HUNTED (Book #5)

ONCE PINED (Book #6)

ONCE FORSAKEN (Book #7)

ONCE COLD (Book #8)

ONCE STALKED (Book #9)

ONCE LOST (Book #10)

ONCE BURIED (Book #11)

ONCE BOUND (Book #12)

ONCE TRAPPED (Book #13)

ONCE DORMANT (book #14)

ONCE SHUNNED (Book #15)

MACKENZIE WHITE MYSTERY SERIES

BEFORE HE KILLS (Book #1)

BEFORE HE SEES (Book #2)

BEFORE HE COVETS (Book #3)

BEFORE HE TAKES (Book #4)

BEFORE HE NEEDS (Book #5)

BEFORE HE FEELS (Book #6)

BEFORE HE SINS (Book #7)

BEFORE HE HUNTS (Book #8)

BEFORE HE PREYS (Book #9)

BEFORE HE LONGS (Book #10)

BEFORE HE LAPSES (Book #11)

AVERY BLACK MYSTERY SERIES

CAUSE TO KILL (Book #1)

CAUSE TO RUN (Book #2)

CAUSE TO HIDE (Book #3)

CAUSE TO FEAR (Book #4)

CAUSE TO SAVE (Book #5)

CAUSE TO DREAD (Book #6)

KERI LOCKE MYSTERY SERIES

A TRACE OF DEATH (Book #1)

A TRACE OF MURDER (Book #2)

A TRACE OF VICE (Book #3)

A TRACE OF CRIME (Book #4)

A TRACE OF HOPE (Book #5)

Recap of Book 1 in the Jessie Hunt series

In “The Perfect Wife,” masters candidate in forensic psychology Jessie Hunt and her investment banker husband, Kyle Voss, leave their downtown Los Angeles apartment for a McMansion in the Orange County community of Westport Beach after he gets transferred and promoted.

While Kyle is thrilled about their new life, Jessie had misgivings and feels uncomfortable among the entitled elite. Nonetheless, she tries to embrace their new life, making friends in the neighborhood and joining the local yacht club with its secret, seemingly sinister rituals.

In class, Jessie impresses visiting lecturer LAPD detective Ryan Hernandez by solving a complicated case study. To complete her field work, she manages to get assigned to a nearby state mental hospital where notorious serial killer Bolton Crutchfield is incarcerated.

Crutchfield’s crimes remind her of a man called the Ozarks Executioner, who abducted and killed dozens of people when she was a child in Missouri. Those abducted included Jessie and her mother, who was murdered in front of her. Jessie sees Dr. Janice Lemmon regularly to deal with the trauma.

In interviews, Crutchfield reveals that he is an admirer of the Ozarks Executioner, who was never caught, and that they’ve somehow communicated. He also suggests, based purely on observing and talking to Jessie, that her suspicions about her new wealthy, lifestyle are legitimate.

As her criminal profiling skills improve, a now-pregnant Jessie discovers the yacht club is actually a front for a high-end prostitution ring. She also uncovers the dark truth about her husband: Kyle is a sociopath who killed a club worker he’d been sleeping with and has tried to frame Jessie for it. Jessie has a miscarriage, a result of being drugged by Kyle. Only Jessie’s quick thinking prevents Kyle from killing her, as well as two neighbors. She is injured but Kyle is arrested.

Jessie returns to her old neighborhood in downtown L.A. to rebuild her life. Not long after, the mental hospital’s head of security, Kat Gentry, visits Jessie and passes along a message from Crutchfield: The Ozarks Executioner is looking for her. Jessie reveals to Kat her deepest secret: the reason The Ozarks Executioner is pursuing her is because he is her father.

Jessie Hunt is a soon-to-be divorced aspiring criminal profiler.

Kyle Voss is her sociopathic, now jailed, estranged husband.

Bolton Crutchfield is a brilliant serial killer who idolizes Jessie’s murderous father.

Kat Gentry is the head of security at the mental hospital where Crutchfield is incarcerated.

Dr. Janice Lemmon is Jessie’s psychiatrist and a former profiler herself.

Lacy Cartwright is Jessie’s college friend, with whom she’s staying for now.

Ryan Hernandez is the LAPD detective who lectured in Jessie’s class.

The Ozarks Executioner is a notorious, never-caught serial killer—and Jessie’s father.

CHAPTER ONE

Splinters from the wooden arms of the chair dug into Jessica Thurman’s forearms, which were tied to the chair by a coarse rope. The skin on her arms was raw and bleeding in several places from her constant attempts to yank herself free.

Jessica was strong for a six-year-old. But not strong enough to break free of the ropes her captor had strapped to her. She could do nothing but sit there with her eyelids taped open as she watched her own mother stand helplessly before her, her arms manacled to the wooden ceiling beams of the isolated Ozarks cabin where they were both being held.

She could hear the whispers of their abductor, standing behind her, instructing her to watch, softly calling her “Junebug.” She knew the voice well.

After all, it belonged to her father.

Suddenly, with an unexpected strength she didn’t think possible, little Jessica flung her body sideways, sending the chair—and her along with it—toppling to the ground. She didn’t feel the thud of hitting the floor, which she found odd.

She looked up and saw that she was no longer lying in the cabin. Instead, she was on the hallway floor of an impressive, modern mansion. And she was no longer six-year-old Jessica Thurman. She was now twenty-eight-year-old Jessie Hunt, lying on the floor of her own home, staring up at a man holding a fireplace poker above his head, about to bring it down on her. But the man was no longer her father.

Instead, it was her husband, Kyle.

His eyes blazed with frenzied intensity as he thrust the poker down toward her face.

She brought her arms up to defend herself but knew it was too late.

Jessie woke up with a gasp. Her hands were still raised above her head as if to block an attack. But she was alone in the apartment bedroom. She pushed herself forward in bed so that she was sitting upright. Her body along with the bed sheets were covered in sweat. Her heart was nearly beating out of her chest.

She swung her legs off the bed and placed her feet on the floor as she bent over, resting her elbows on her thighs and her head in her palms. After giving her body a few seconds to acclimate to her real surroundings—the downtown Los Angeles apartment of her friend Lacy—she glanced at the bedside clock. It was 3:54 a.m.

As she felt the sweat start to dry on her skin, she reassured herself.

I am no longer in that cabin. I am no longer in that house. I am safe. These are just nightmares. Those men can’t hurt me anymore.

But of course only half of that was true. While her soon-to-be-ex-husband, Kyle, was locked up in jail awaiting trial for various crimes, including attempting to murder her, her father had never been captured.

He still haunted her dreams regularly. Worse, she had recently learned that even though she had been placed into Witness Protection as a child, given a new home and a new name, he was still out there looking for her.

Jessie stood up and headed for the shower. There was no point in trying to go back to sleep. She knew it would be useless.

Besides, an idea was circling in her head, one that she wanted to cultivate. Maybe it was time she stopped accepting that these nightmares were inevitable. Maybe she needed to stop fearing the day her father found her.

Maybe it was time to hunt him.

CHAPTER TWO

By the time her old college friend and current roommate Lacy Cartwright came out to the breakfast room, Jessie had been awake for over three hours. She had brewed a fresh pot of coffee and poured a cup for Lacy, who walked over and took it gratefully as she offered a sympathetic smile.

“Another bad dream?” she asked.

Jessie nodded. In the six weeks that Jessie had been living in Lacy’s apartment, trying to rebuild her life, her friend had gotten used to the semi-regular middle-of the-night screams and early morning wakeups. It had happened occasionally in college, so it wasn’t a total surprise. But the frequency had increased dramatically since her husband had tried to kill her.

“Was I loud?” Jessie asked apologetically.

“A little,” Lacy acknowledged. “But you stopped yelling after a couple of seconds. I went right back to sleep.”

“I’m really sorry, Lace. Maybe I should buy you better earplugs until I move out, or a louder noise-canceling machine. I swear it won’t be much longer.”

“Don’t worry about it. You’re handling things much better than I would be,” Lacy insisted as she tied her long hair in a ponytail.

“That’s nice of you to say.”

“I’m not just being polite, girl. Think about it. In the last two months, your husband murdered a woman, tried to frame you for it, and then attempted to kill you when you figured it out. That doesn’t include your miscarriage.”

Jessie nodded but didn’t say anything. Lacy’s list of horribles didn’t include her serial killer father because Lacy didn’t know about him; almost no one did. Jessie preferred it that way—for her own safety and for theirs. Lacy continued.

“If it was me, I’d still be curled up in the fetal position. The fact that you’re almost done with physical therapy and about to enter a special FBI training program makes me wonder if you’re some kind of cyborg.”

Jessie had to admit that when things were laid out like that, it was pretty impressive that she was so functional. Her hand involuntarily moved to the spot on the left side of her abdomen where Kyle had plunged the fireplace poker. The doctors had told her she was lucky it had missed her internal organs.

She had an ugly scar. It made for an unsightly addition to go with the one from childhood that cut across her collarbone. She still felt a sharp twinge in her gut every now and then. But mostly she felt okay. She’d been given permission to ditch the walking cane a week ago and her physical therapist had only scheduled one more rehab session, which was today. After that, she was supposed to do the required exercises on her own. As to the mental and emotional rehab required after learning her husband was a sociopathic murderer, she was far from getting an all-clear.

“I guess things aren’t that bad,” she finally replied unconvincingly as she watched her friend finish getting dressed.

Lacy slid on her three-inch heels, turning her from a tall woman into a full-on Amazon. All long legs and cheekbones, she looked more like a runway model than an aspiring fashion designer. Her hair was tied back in a high ponytail that revealed her neck. She was meticulously decked out in an outfit of her own design. She might be a buyer for a high-end boutique right now. But she had plans to have her own design firm before thirty and be the highest-profile lesbian African-American fashion designer in the country soon after that.

“I don’t get you, Jessie,” she said as she threw on her coat. “You get accepted into a prestigious FBI program at Quantico for promising criminal profilers and you seem to be lukewarm to the idea. I’d think you’d jump at the chance to change your surroundings for a bit. Besides, it’s only ten weeks. It’s not like you have to move there.”

“You’re right,” Jessie agreed as she downed the last of her third cup of coffee. “It’s just that there’s so much going on right now, I’m not sure the time is right. The divorce from Kyle isn’t final yet. I still have to lock down the sale of the house in Westport Beach. I’m not a hundred percent physically. And I wake up screaming most nights. I don’t know that I’m up for the rigors of the FBI’s behavior analysis training program just yet.”

“Well, you better decide quickly,” Lacy said as she moved to the front door. “Don’t you have to give them an answer by the end of the week?”

“I do.”

“Well, let me know what you decide. Also, can you open the window to your bedroom before you head out? No offense but it smells a bit like a gym in there.”

She was gone before Jessie could reply, though she wasn’t sure what to say to that. Lacy was a great friend who could always be counted on to give her honest opinion. But tact wasn’t her strong suit.

Jessie got up and headed to her room to change. She caught a glimpse of herself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door and didn’t immediately recognize herself. On the surface, she still looked the same, with her shoulder-length brown hair, her green eyes, her tall, five-foot-ten frame.

But the eyes were red-rimmed with exhaustion, and the hair was stringy and greasy, so much so that she decided to put it in a ponytail and wear a cap. And she felt permanently hunched, a result of the ever-present worry that her abdomen might unexpectedly pulse in pain.

Will I ever get back to who I was? Does that person even still exist?

She shook the thought away, forcing the self-pity to take a backseat, at least for a while. She was too busy to cater to it right now.

It was time to get ready for her physical therapy session, her meeting with the apartment broker, her appointment with her psychiatrist, and then one with her OB-GYN. It was going to be a full day of pretending to be a functional human being.

The apartment broker, a petite whirling dervish in a pantsuit named Bridget, was showing her the third apartment of the morning when Jessie started getting the urge to jump off a balcony.

Everything was fine at first. She was on a bit of a high from her final physical therapy session, which had ended with the pronouncement that she was “reasonably equipped for the tasks of daily living.” Bridget had kept things moving as they looked at the first two apartments, focusing on unit details, pricing, and amenities. It was only when they got to the third option, the only one Jessie was intrigued by so far, that the personal questions began.

“Are you sure you’re only interested in one-bedrooms?” Bridget asked. “I can tell you like this one. But there’s a two-bedroom one floor up with virtually the same floor plan. It’s only thirty thousand dollars more and it would have greater resale value. Plus, you never know what your situation might be a couple of years from now.”

“That’s true,” Jessie acknowledged, mentally noting that only two months ago she was married, pregnant, and living in a mansion in Orange County. Now she was separated from an admitted killer, she’d lost her unborn child, and she was bunking with a friend from school. “But I’m fine with a one-bedroom.”

“Of course,” Bridget said in a tone that suggested she wasn’t about to let it lie. “Do you mind if I ask what your circumstances are? It might better help me target your preferences. I can’t help but notice the skin on your finger is white where a wedding ring might recently have been. I could gear location choices based on whether you’re looking to aggressively move on or… hunker down.”

“We’re in the right area,” Jessie said, her voice tightening involuntarily. “I just want to see one-bedrooms around here. That’s the only information you need right now, Bridget.”

“Of course. I’m sorry,” Bridget said, chastened.

“I need to borrow the restroom for a moment,” Jessie said, the tightness in her throat now expanding to her chest. She wasn’t sure what was happening to her. “Is that okay?”

“No problem,” Bridget said. “You remember where it is, down the hall?”

Jessie nodded and walked there as quickly as she could without actually running. By the time she got in and locked the door, she feared she might pass out. It felt like a panic attack coming on.

What the hell is happening to me?

She splashed her face with cold water, then rested her palms on the counter as she ordered herself to take slow, deep breaths.

Images flashed through her head without rhyme or reason: cuddling on the couch with Kyle, shivering in an isolated cabin deep in the Ozark Mountains, looking at the ultrasound of her unborn and never-to-be-born child, reading a bedtime story in a rocking chair with her adoptive father, watching as her husband dumped a body from a yacht in the waters off the coast, the sound of her father whispering “Junebug” in her ear.

Why Bridget’s mostly innocuous question about her circumstances and references to hunkering down had set her off, Jessie didn’t know. But they had and now she was in a cold sweat, shaking involuntarily, staring back in the mirror at a person she barely recognized.

It was a good thing her next stop was to see her therapist. The thought calmed Jessie slightly and she took a few more deep breaths before leaving the bathroom and heading down the hall to the front door.

“I’ll be in touch,” she called out to Bridget as she closed the door behind her. But she wasn’t sure she would be. Right now she wasn’t sure of anything.

CHAPTER THREE

Dr. Janice Lemmon’s office was only a few blocks from the apartment building Jessie was leaving and she was glad for the chance to walk and clear her head. As she walked down Figueroa, she almost welcomed the sharp, cutting wind making her eyes water and immediately dry up. The bracing cold pushed most thoughts other than moving fast from her head.

She zipped her coat up to the neck and put her head down as she passed a coffee shop, then a diner filled to near overflowing. It was mid-December in Los Angeles and local businesses were doing their best to make their storefronts look holiday festive in a town where snow was almost an abstract concept.

But in the wind tunnels created by downtown skyscrapers, cold was ever-present. It was almost 11 a.m. but the sky was gray and the temperature was in the low fifties. Tonight it would drop close to forty. For L.A., that was bone-chilling. Of course, Jessie had been through far more frigid weather.

As a child in rural Missouri, before everything fell apart, she would play in the tiny front yard of her mom’s mobile home in the trailer park, her fingers and face half-numb, fashioning unimpressive but happy-faced snowmen while her mom watched protectively from the window. Jessie remembered wondering why her mother never took her eyes off her. Looking back now, it was clear.

A few years later, in the suburbs of Las Cruces, New Mexico, where she’d lived with her adoptive family after going into Witness Protection, she would go skiing on the bunny slopes of the nearby mountains with her second father, an FBI agent who projected calm professionalism, no matter the situation. He was always there to help her up when she fell. And she could usually count on a hot chocolate when they got off the barren, windswept hills and went back to the lodge.

Those chilly memories warmed her as she rounded the final block to Dr. Lemmon’s office. She meticulously chose not to think about the less pleasant memories that inevitably intertwined with the good ones.

She checked in and peeled off her layers as she waited to be called into the doctor’s office. It didn’t take long. Right at 11 a.m., her therapist opened the door and welcomed her inside.

Dr. Janice Lemmon was in her mid-sixties but didn’t look it. She was in great shape and her eyes, behind thick glasses, were sharp and focused. Her curly blonde ringlets bounced when she walked and she had a coiled intensity that couldn’t be masked.

They sat down in plush chairs across from each other. Dr. Lemmon gave her a few moments to settle in before speaking.

“How are you?” she asked in that open-ended way that always made Jessie genuinely ponder the question more seriously than she did in her daily life.

“I’ve been better,” she admitted.

“Why is that?”

Jessie recounted her panic attack in the apartment and the subsequent flashbacks.

“I don’t know what set me off,” she said in conclusion.

“I think you do,” Dr. Lemmon prodded.

“Care to give me a hint?” Jessie countered.

“Well, I’m wondering if you lost your cool in the presence of a near stranger because you don’t feel like you have any other place to release your anxiety. Let me ask you this—do you have any stressful events or decisions coming up?”

“You mean other than an OB-GYN appointment in two hours to see if I’m recovered from my miscarriage, finalizing a divorce from the man who tried to murder me, selling the house we shared together, processing the fact that my serial killer father is looking for me, deciding whether or not to go to Virginia for two and a half months to have FBI instructors laugh at me, and having to move out of my friend’s apartment so she can get a decent night’s sleep? Besides those things, I’d say I’m cool.”

“That does sound like quite a bit,” Dr. Lemmon replied, ignoring Jessie’s sarcasm. “Why don’t we start with the immediate concerns and work outward from there, okay?”

“You’re the boss,” Jessie muttered.

“Actually, I’m not. But tell me about your upcoming appointment. Why does that have you concerned?”

“It’s not so much that I’m concerned,” Jessie said. “The doctor already told me that it looks like I don’t have any permanent damage and will be able to conceive in the future. It’s more that I know going there will remind of what I lost and how I lost it.”

“You’re talking about how your husband drugged you so he could frame you for murdering Natalia Urgova? And how the drug he used induced your miscarriage?”

“Yes,” Jessie said drily. “That’s what I’m talking about.”

“Well, I’ll be surprised if anyone there brings that up,” Dr. Lemmon said, a gentle smile playing at her lips.

“So you’re saying I’m creating stress for myself about a situation that need not be stressful?”