Lieutenant Taylor Jackson Collection, Volume 1 Read online

  Rediscover the incomparable Lieutenant Taylor Jackson in this gripping psychological thriller series by New York Times bestselling author J.T. Ellison, now available in a four-book box set, containing stories 1-4.

  Field of Graves

  A madman is trying to create his own end-of-days apocalypse and the cops trying to catch him are almost as damaged as the killer. Lt. Taylor Jackson, alongside medical examiner Samantha Owens and troubled FBI profiler Dr. Baldwin, work to find the killer before he can claim another victim.

  All the Pretty Girls

  Nashville Homicide Lt. Taylor Jackson is tracking the Southern Strangler, a sadistic killer terrorizing the southeast. Working with her lover, FBI profiler Dr. John Baldwin, she’ll have to battle an old injury and her own demons to stop the murders from spiraling out of control.

  14

  Four victims are found marked with the fatal signature of a serial killer who terrorized Nashville decades ago—throats slit, red lipstick on their lips. Lt. Taylor Jackson believes it’s a copycat who is even more terrifying, honing his craft by mimicking the murders.

  Judas Kiss

  The horrific murder of a pregnant woman creates a media frenzy that unearths shocking secrets. When Taylor Jackson’s reputation is threatened by some implicating footage, she’ll have to sort through which evidence is real in order solve a case of obsessive vengeance.

  Lieutenant Taylor Jackson Collection Volume 1

  Field of Graves

  All the Pretty Girls

  14

  Judas Kiss

  J.T. Ellison

  Table of Contents

  Field of Graves

  By J.T. Ellison

  All the Pretty Girls

  By J.T. Ellison

  14

  By J.T. Ellison

  Judas Kiss

  By J.T. Ellison

  With FIELD OF GRAVES, New York Times bestselling author J.T. Ellison goes back to where it all began…

  All of Nashville is on edge with a serial killer on the loose. A madman is trying to create his own end-of-days apocalypse and the cops trying to catch him are almost as damaged as the killer. Field of Graves reveals the origins of some of J.T. Ellison’s most famous creations: the haunted Lieutenant Taylor Jackson; her blunt, exceptional best friend, medical examiner Dr. Samantha Owens; and troubled FBI profiler Dr. John Baldwin. Together, they race the clock and their own demons to find the killer before he claims yet another victim. This dark, thrilling and utterly compelling novel will have readers on the edge of their seats, and Ellison’s fans will be delighted with the revelations about their favorite characters.

  FIELD OF GRAVES

  J.T. ELLISON

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  THE FIRST DAY

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  THE SECOND DAY

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  THE THIRD DAY

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  THE FOURTH DAY

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  THE FIFTH DAY

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  THE SIXTH DAY

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  EPILOGUE

  AUTHOR NOTE

  When the Lamb broke the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, “Come.” I looked, and behold, an ashen horse; and he who sat on it had the name Death; and Hades was following with him. Authority was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword and with famine and with pestilence and by the wild beasts of the earth.

  —Revelation 6:7–8

  PROLOGUE

  Taylor picked up her portable phone for the tenth time in ten minutes. She hit Redial, heard the call connect and start ringing, then clicked the Off button and returned the phone to her lap. Once she made this call, there was no going back. Being right wouldn’t make her the golden girl. If she were wrong—well, she didn’t want to think about what could happen. Losing her job would be the least of her worries.

  Damned if she did. Damned if she didn’t.

  She set the phone on the pool table and went down the stairs of her small two-story cabin. In the kitchen, she opened the door to the refrigerator and pulled out a Diet Coke. She laughed to herself. As if more caffeine would give her the courage to make the call. She should try a shot of whiskey. That always worked in the movies.

  She snapped open the tab and stood staring out of her kitchen window. It had been dark for hours—the moon gone and the inky blackness outside her window impenetrable—but in an hour the skies would lighten. She would have to make a decision by then.

  She turned away from the window and heard a loud crack. The lights went out. She jumped a mile, then giggled nervously, a hand to her chest to stop the sudden pounding. Silly girl, she thought. The lights go out all the time. There was a Nashville Electric Service crew on the corner when you drove in earlier; they must have messed up the line and a power surge caused the lights to blow. It happens every time NES works on the lines. Now stop it. You’re a grown woman. You’re not afraid of the dark.

  She reached into her junk drawer and groped for a flashlight. Thumbing the switch, she cursed softly when the light didn’t shine. Batteries, where were the batteries?

  She froze when she heard the noise and immediately went on alert, all of her senses going into overdrive. She strained her ears, trying to hear it again. Yes, there it was. A soft scrape off the back porch. She took a deep breath and sidled out of the kitchen, keeping close to the wall, moving lightly toward the back door. She brought her hand to her side and found nothing. Damn it. She’d left her gun upstairs.

  The tinkling of breaking glass brought her up short. The French doors leading into the backyard had been breached. It was too late to head upstairs and get the gun. She would have to walk right through the living room to get to the stairs.
Whoever had just broken through her back door was not going to let her stroll on by. She started edging back toward the kitchen, holding her breath, as if that would help her not make any noise.

  She didn’t see the fist, only felt it crack against her jaw. Her eyes swelled with tears, and before she could react, the fist connected again. She spun and hit the wall face-first. The impact knocked her breath out. Her lips cut on the edge of her teeth; she tasted blood. The intruder grabbed her as she started to slide down the wall. Yanked her to her feet and put his hands around her throat, squeezing hard.

  Now she knew exactly where her attacker was, and she fought back with everything she had. She struggled against him, quickly realizing she was in trouble. He was stronger than her, bigger than her. And he was there to kill.

  She went limp, lolled bonelessly against him, surprising him with the sudden weight. He released one arm in response, and she took that moment to whirl around and shove with all her might. It created some space between them, enabling her to slip out of his grasp. She turned quickly but crashed into the slate end table. He was all over her. They struggled their way into the living room. She began to plan. Kicked away again.

  Her attacker lunged after her. She used the sturdy side table to brace herself and whipped out her left arm in a perfect jab, aiming lower than where she suspected his chin would be. She connected perfectly and heard him grunt in pain. Spitting blood out of her mouth in satisfaction, she followed the punch with a kick to his stomach, heard the whoosh of his breath as it left his body. He fell hard against the wall. She spun away and leapt to the stairs. He jumped up to pursue her, but she was quicker. She pounded up the stairs as fast as she could, rounding the corner into the hall just as her attacker reached the landing. Her weapon was in its holster, on the bookshelf next to the pool table, right where she had left it when she’d gone downstairs for the soda. She was getting careless. She should never have taken it off her hip. With everything that was happening, she shouldn’t have taken for granted that she was safe in her own home.

  Her hand closed around the handle of the weapon. She pulled the Glock from its holster, whipped around to face the door as the man came tearing through it. She didn’t stop to think about the repercussions, simply reacted. Her hand rose by instinct, and she put a bullet right between his eyes. His momentum carried him forward a few paces. He was only five feet from her, eyes black in death, when he dropped with a thud.

  She heard her own ragged breathing. She tasted blood and raised a bruised hand to her jaw, feeling her lips and her teeth gingerly. Son of a bitch had caught her right in the jaw and loosened two molars. The adrenaline rush left her. She collapsed on the floor next to the lifeless body. She might have even slept for a moment.

  The throbbing in her jaw brought her back. Morning was beginning to break, enough to see the horrible mess in front of her. The cat was sitting on the pool table, watching her curiously.

  Rising, she took in the scene. The man was collapsed on her game room floor, slowly leaking blood on her Berber carpet. She peered at the stain.

  “That’s going to be a bitch to get out.”

  She shook her head to clear the cobwebs. What an inane thing to say. Shock, she must be going into shock. How long had they fought? Had it been only five minutes? Half an hour? She felt as though she had struggled against him for days; her body was tired and sore. Never mind the blood caked around her mouth. She put her hand up to her face. Make that her nose, too.

  She eyed the man again. He was facedown and angled slightly to one side. She slipped her toes under his right arm and flipped him over with her foot. The shot was true; she could see a clean entry wound in his forehead. Reaching down out of habit, she felt for his carotid pulse, but there was nothing. He was definitely dead.

  “Oh, David,” she said. “You complete idiot. Look what you’ve made me do.”

  Now the shit was absolutely going to hit the fan. It was time to make the call.

  THE

  FIRST

  DAY

  CHAPTER 1

  Three months later

  Nashville, Tennessee

  Bodies, everywhere bodies, a field of graves, limbs and torsos and heads, all left above ground. The feeling of dirt in her mouth, grimy and thick; the whispers from the dead, long arms reaching for her as she passed through the carnage. Ghostly voices, soft and sibilant. “Help us. Why won’t you help us?”

  Taylor jerked awake, sweating, eyes wild and blind in the darkness. The sheets twisted around her body in a claustrophobic shroud, and she struggled to get them untangled. She squeezed her eyes shut, willed her breathing back to normal, trying to relax, to let the grisly images go. When she opened her eyes, the room was still dark but no longer menacing. Her screams had faded away into the silence. The cat jumped off the bed with a disgruntled meow in response to her thrashing.

  She laid her head back on the pillow, swallowed hard, still unable to get a full breath.

  Every damn night. She was starting to wonder if she’d ever sleep well again.

  She wiped a hand across her face and looked at the clock: 6:10 a.m. The alarm was set for seven, but she wasn’t going to get any more rest. She might as well get up and get ready for work. Go in a little early, see what horrors had captured the city overnight.

  She rolled off the bed, trying hard to forget the dream. Showered, dressed, dragged on jeans and a black cashmere T-shirt under a black motorcycle jacket, stepped into her favorite boots. Put her creds in her pocket and her gun on her hip. Pulled her wet hair off her face and into a ponytail.

  Time to face another day.

  She was in her car when the call came. “Morning, Fitz. What’s up?”

  “Morning, LT. We have us a body at the Parthenon.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  *

  It might have become a perfect late-autumn morning. The sky was busy, turning from white to blue as dawn rudely forced its way into day. Birds were returning from their mysterious nocturnal errands, greeting and chattering about the night’s affairs. The air was clear and heavy, still muggy from the overnight heat but holding a hint of coolness, like an ice cube dropped into a steaming mug of coffee. The sky would soon shift to sapphire the way only autumn skies do, as clear and heavy as the precious stone itself.

  The beauty of the morning was lost on Lieutenant Taylor Jackson, Criminal Investigation Division, Nashville Metro Police. She snapped her long body under the yellow crime scene tape and looked around for a moment. Sensed the looks from the officers around her. Straightened her shoulders and marched toward them.

  Metro officers had been traipsing around the crime scene control area like it was a cocktail party, drinking coffee and chatting each other up as though they’d been apart for weeks, not hours. The grass was already littered with cups, cigarette butts, crumpled notebook paper, and at least one copy of the morning’s sports section from The Tennessean. Taylor cursed silently; they knew better than this. These yahoos were going to inadvertently contaminate a crime scene one of these days, sending her team off on a wild-goose chase. Guess whose ass would be in the proverbial sling then?

  She stooped to grab the sports page, surreptitiously glanced at the headline regaling the Tennessee Titans’ latest win, then crumpled it into a firm ball in her hands.

  Taylor didn’t know what information about the murder had leaked out over the air, but the curiosity factor had obviously kicked into high gear. An officer she recognized from another sector was cruising by to check things out, not wanting to miss out on all the fun. Media vans lined the street. Joggers pretending not to notice anything was happening nearly tripped trying to see what all the fuss was about. Exactly what she needed on no sleep: everyone willing to help, to get in and screw up her crime scene.

  Striding toward the melee, she tried to tell herself that it wasn’t their fault she’d been up all night. At least she’d had a shower and downed two Diet Cokes, or she would have arrested them all.

  She re
ached the command post and pasted on a smile. “Mornin’, kids. How many of you have dragged this crap through my crime scene?” She tossed the balled-up paper at the closest officer.

  She tried to keep her tone light, as if she were amused by their shenanigans, but she didn’t fool anyone, and the levity disappeared from the gathering. The brass was on the scene, so all the fun had come to a screeching halt. Uniforms who didn’t belong started to drift away, one or two giving Taylor a sideways glance. She ignored them, the way she ignored most things these days.

  As a patrol officer, she’d kept her head down, worked her cases, and developed a reputation for being a straight shooter. Her dedication and clean work had been rewarded with promotion after promotion; she was in plainclothes at twenty-eight. She’d caught a nasty first case in Homicide—the kidnapping and murder of a young girl. She’d nailed the bastard who’d done it; Richard Curtis was on death row now. The case made the national news and sent her career into overdrive. She quickly became known for being a hard-hitting investigator and moved up the ranks from detective to lead to sergeant, until she’d been given the plum job she had now—homicide lieutenant.