What he really needed was to return to his morning jogs, he wryly acknowledged. How long had it been since he’d last exercised on a regular basis? A year ago? Two?
He swallowed a sigh. His mother was right. He was too old to be a bachelor. Living alone meant that he didn’t have any reason to stop working at a reasonable hour. No one cared if he was home for dinner, or if he made plans for his weekend. It also meant that he didn’t take care of himself like he should.
Too many takeout meals eaten at work and not enough time on the treadmill.
He shook his head, dismissing his bout of self-pity. It wouldn’t matter if he had a wife and ten kids waiting for him at home; he wasn’t going anywhere for a while.
The Butcher was back, and if Ash was right and the bastard was hunting Remi Walsh, Jax’s every waking minute was going to be spent chasing down leads. Eventually, one of them would lead him to the killer.
Refusing to contemplate the thought of failure, he rounded the partition wall and came to a sharp halt. His eyes narrowed as he took in the sight of the man who was leaning over his desk, flipping through the tall stack of files.
What the hell?
He moved forward, watching as the man abruptly straightened and whirled to face him.
Bruce O’Reilly.
The detective was a year younger than Jax, although he looked like he was a decade older. He had a big, square head with dark hair he kept buzzed next to his skull. His skin was ruddy and sagged near his jaws, giving him the appearance of a bulldog. His body was equally square, with a growing paunch that threatened to bust through his white shirt.
“Jax.” The man pushed his hands in his pockets, trying to act as if he hadn’t been nosing through Jax’s desk.
“O’Reilly.” Jax glanced toward his desk. “Are you looking for something?”
O’Reilly folded his arms over his chest. “Just curious.”
“About what?”
“I heard you caught the Jane Doe from the park.”
Jax shrugged. “She’s not a Jane Doe. We have an ID.”
O’Reilly barely listened. Clearly, he wasn’t interested in the identity of the murder victim. “The rumor is that you’re claiming it was the work of the Butcher.”
Jax tensed as he felt prickles of unease dance over his skin. O’Reilly wasn’t just being nosy. He was here with a purpose.
“I’m not claiming anything,” Jax said with complete honesty. He wanted to keep a lid on his Butcher theory. The longer he could go without the press breathing down his neck, the better. Unfortunately, he needed to coordinate between several units, which meant it was inevitable that gossip would spread. “I’m just working the case.”
“Was her throat slit?” O’Reilly demanded.
“I don’t have the coroner’s report yet.”
O’Reilly glared at him. Something that would have been a lot more intimidating if he wasn’t four inches shorter than Jax.
“Don’t be an ass.”
“The only one being an ass is you, O’Reilly.”
“Just like your brother.”
Jax chuckled at the muttered words. “I take that as a compliment.”
“You shouldn’t,” O’Reilly snapped. “If he’d listened to me, he would still be a detective.”
Jax bristled. He’d never liked the younger detective. He was crude, brash, and overbearing. As far as he knew, O’Reilly didn’t have any friends in the department. “What are you talking about?”
O’Reilly glanced around, as if making sure there was no one close enough to overhear their conversation. “Look, it might be politically incorrect to talk bad about the dead, but Gage Walsh was blinded by his ambition.”
Jax snorted in disbelief. “That’s bullshit.”
“Is it?” The man shrugged. “You know I was his partner?”
Jax had a vague memory of O’Reilly being teamed with Gage for a short time. It’d been several years ago. “So?”
“Walsh wasn’t a bad detective.” O’Reilly turned so he could settle his fat ass on the corner of the desk. “But he was always looking to score a high-profile case.”
“I never heard that about him.”
“It’s not something he spread around, but I think he had political aspirations.” He spoke stiffly. Almost as if he’d practiced the words.
“Gage?” Jax made no effort to disguise his skepticism. “You’re out of your mind. He hated bullshit politics.”
O’Reilly jutted his chin to a stubborn angle. “Maybe it was his wife pushing him. But he drove me nuts with his complaints that we were stuck investigating gangbangers and drug dealers.”
Jax rolled his eyes. “We all get frustrated. Don’t tell me you don’t ever complain.”
“Yeah, but he started exaggerating our reports.”
Jax might not have known Gage Walsh as well as his brother, but he did know that he’d been a damned good detective. And an honest one. “You’re going to have to be more specific.”
“Sometimes he implied our perp was a drug lord or that the case was connected to government corruption,” O’Reilly said, keeping his accusations vague enough it would be difficult to call him a liar. “When I refused to back up his claims, he dumped me for your brother. He assumed a hotshot Marcel would play his game. And he was right.”
Jax took a quick step forward, barely resisting the urge to punch the jerk in the face. “Be very, very careful of what you say next, O’Reilly,” he warned, his voice lethally soft.
O’Reilly tried to look casual, but Jax didn’t miss the nerve twitching next to his eye. The man knew he was asking for trouble, but still he pressed on.
“I’m not saying Ash was corrupt, but he was eager enough to jump on the bandwagon that there was a serial killer in Chicago.”
“Probably because there was a serial killer in Chicago.”
“We had a spate of women getting their throats slit,” O’Reilly said, his tone indicating he thought it was the women’s fault. “Maybe they were connected and maybe they weren’t. Either way, Walsh and your brother made sure they were the center of attention.”
Jax grimly leashed his flare of fury. There was no one in the Chicago Police Department who had doubted there was a serial killer. Or ever implied they thought Gage or Ash were camera hogs in search of personal fame.
So why was O’Reilly making his wild accusations? Sour grapes? Or something more nefarious?
Suddenly, Jax thought back to standing next to his brother in his storage unit. Ash had kept his and Gage’s notes hidden. Did he suspect someone in the department might be overly interested in the case?
Tucking the suspicion in the back of his mind, Jax studied the detective’s ruddy face. “So, if your theory is that there was no Butcher, who do you think killed Gage?”
O’Reilly gave a lift of one shoulder. “That daughter of his was obviously unhinged. Who knows what happened that night?”
Abruptly, Jax had endured enough. Remi Walsh had been kidnapped, terrorized, and then was plagued with guilt at the death of her father. Now this jackass was implying she was somehow responsible.
“Get away from my desk,” he rasped.