Second Watch

Book 0: An Alice Madison Short

by Valentina Giambanco

Genres: Police Procedurals; Female Sleuths

Synopsis

Alice Madison, fresh from police academy, tries to seem like she knows what she's doing when she's assigned to stand guard over a young woman on suicide watch who was found burying the body of a newborn baby in the woods. Over the course of four short afternoons, Madison learns a little bit more about Christy Rae Finch--enough to set her off on her own investigation . . .

Release date: December 13, 2016

Publisher: Quercus

Print pages: 27

Sample

The doors of the hospital elevator swished closed and Alice Madison knew what she would see in the reflection of the metal doors: her police uniform was freshly ironed, her badge was shiny, and her name tag was polished. There was no getting away from it. The whole world could see that she was brand new, so green that there should be leaves growing off her hat—her brand new Seattle Police Department hat.

Madison adjusted the heavy belt and sighed. Other students at the police academy had worn the uniform and looked old enough to order a beer at Jimmy’s—the neighborhood cop bar. Madison would get carded at the door.

She was glad to be alone in the elevator as it rode to the seventh floor and to her shift assignment. She breathed in and brushed the raindrops off her coat sleeves. This was the time to get ready for what was coming, and whether she looked young enough to go to prom was neither here nor there.

The shift commander had told her what to expect, but her heart was beating fast and her chest ached with adrenaline.

Madison had only received the assignment because everyone else was busy with a presidential visit, and second watch—the shift between 11:00 and 20:00—was considered the hospital snooze shift. It had been made absolutely clear to her that she was expected to say nothing, do nothing, except sit quietly, and that she should not interact in any way with the object of her task.

“Tell me you haven’t looked up the case in the papers,” the sergeant had said before sending her on her way. “The papers know diddly-squat.”

“I haven’t,” M. . .