Lucky Thirteen (31 page)

About Ten Year
s Later...

C
hief
of Police Raiford Reynolds reluctantly answered his phone as he sat across a romantically set table in the finest restaurant in Eau Bouease from his lovely wife, Larkin.

“Baker, this had best be of the utmost importance
. You do realize I’m celebrating my thirteenth anniversary with the love of my life, don’t you?”

“Yeah, Ray, I know
. I’m really sorry, but you need to get here ASAP. I think Latrice Descartes has been reincarnated, only this time she seems to be collecting hearts. I have two victims, a male and a female. Their hearts are missing.”

“Don’t make comments like that, Baker
. That nightmare can never happen again. Please, tell me this is a pissed-off significant other getting even with a philandering mate.”

“It could be
.” Brian Baker hesitated.

“Baker, what do I need to know
? Why are you hem-hawing?”

“Ray, the man is Robert LaFontaine.”

His heart thudded. “I’ll be there as soon as I take my wife home.” He clicked his phone shut.

“Another rough case?” Larkin asked.

“Yes, Angel. I have to go.”

“Of course you do
. It’s who you are. I’ll keep your side of the bed warm.”

Ray kissed Larkin’s fingertips
.
She’s the most extraordinary person I’ve ever met. Even after thirteen years of marriage, I still think so.
He dreaded to leave her at this moment. However, Larkin Sloan Reynolds was used to this life. She was, after all, a cop’s wife. Nonetheless, he would not tell her who the victim was just yet.

Ray drove his wife home and walked her to the door of the antebellum home they had restored with the help of Ray’s
twin brother, Raif, an architect and partner with Bertram and Gautier, and raced to a gruesome crime scene. This was who he was.

And Larkin
?

Larkin was Ray’s guardian angel.

About the Author

J
ane
t
Taylor-Perry, a native of Laurel, Mississippi, a graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi with a BS in psychology, Belhaven University with a Master of Arts in teaching, and gifted certification from Mississippi College, is an author, editor, and educator in English, social studies, and gifted. She has taught 5
th
- 12
th
grades in a number of districts in the state. She currently teaches life skills in a variety of areas with Goodwill Industries of Mississippi.

Janet’s
short pieces appeared in
Letters from the Soul,
2002;
Brick Streets Press: 2010 Winner’s Circle;
and
The Magnolia Quarterly
, 2012 and 2013. She’s produced pieces that finished semi-finalist, short-list finalist, and finalist for The Pirates’ Alley Faulkner Wisdom Competition in 2012 and 2013. Memberships include Kappa Delta Epsilon, Red Dog Writers, Gulf Coast Writers’ Association, The Mississippi Writers Guild, and TheNextBigWriter.com.

Inspiration
comes through life experiences. She’s the mother of five and an avid reader who loves anything old and historical from antique cars to old cemeteries. She’s on Facebook @ Author Janet Taylor-Perry.

Heartless

The Raiford Chronicles #2

P
olic
e
Chief Raiford Reynolds did not think there could be a more brutal, heartless killer than Latrice Descartes whom he had encountered fourteen years earlier, but when his thirteenth wedding anniversary dinner is interrupted by one of his detectives to tell him an old married acquaintance  who also happens to be a United States senator has been found murdered in the presence of a much younger woman and that both are missing their hearts, Ray becomes embroiled in another murder mystery that touches even closer to him than the one involving Latrice Descartes.

Having put hostilities aside with Robert LaFontaine, Ray’s past comes back to haunt him. Who would want the good senator dead? Could it possibly be someone Ray loves with all his heart?