by Tracy Wolff
“I’m thinking pills.” Jefferson finished cataloging the sample he’d just taken, then stood to look at them with sad eyes. “Or poison. Her eyes and the broken blood vessels near the surface of her skin are consistent with a number of different kinds of poisoning. I’ll know more when I get her back to the shop. Of course, the bruising makes it hard to tell.”
“If it’s poison we can trace it,” Shawn said as he walked into the room. He looked exhausted, disgusted, horrified—as they all did. But he managed a quick grin when he saw her. “Maybe we finally got lucky.”
“From your mouth to God’s ears.” Luc had just finished his examination of the outside of the property. “I found a set of footprints about fifteen feet from the house. Looks like a pair of male running shoes.”
“Another mistake?” asked Torres. “What’s with this guy tonight? Not that I’m complaining, but it just isn’t like him to be this careless.”
“Maybe it’s not him,” Shawn suggested. “Maybe we’re just chasing our tails here.”
“Oh, it’s him,” Genevieve said as she studied the body with eyes she knew showed too much.”
“We don’t know that for sure—” Shawn objected.
“Yes, we do.” She waited, breath held, wondering if they would trust her. She could see Shawn wanted to argue, took note of the confusion on Luc’s face. Only Torres seemed to understand what she was saying, the eyes he turned on her filled with speculation and more than a little concern.
“All right, then. Assuming this is our guy, what’s going through his head?” Torres steered the conversation smoothly back to the killer. “It’s been less than twenty-four hours since we found the last body—that’s fast, even for him.”
“Which could account for the mistakes.” She leaned forward, looked at the woman’s battered face. “Besides, this was a crime of anger. For all the others, he was stone-cold calm. No mistakes. No emotion. But this one—” She pointed to the deep bruises all over the girl. “This one was filled with rage. Look at the way he beat the hell out of her. That’s not his normal MO.
“Which, once again, could account for the mistakes. No time to plan; no time to sort things through. This is the one we’re going to nail him on, guys. I can feel it.”
“Then let’s do what we do best.” Luc snapped on a pair of gloves. “Delacroix and Webster get the room.”
“And we’ll take the rest of the house,” Torres said as he followed his partner from the room.
“Where are the owners?” Genevieve asked her partner as she crouched next to the body.
“The neighbors don’t know much, just that they left three days ago on vacation. Two doors down had a cell number, but there’s no answer. I left a message.”
“He did her here, in this house.”
“Yeah.” Shawn cleared his throat, looked at her with suddenly shy eyes. “I’m glad you’re back, Delacroix.”
“I’m glad to be back, Webster.” She flashed him a smile. “Even unofficially. Now let’s get to work.”
They worked companionably for over two hours, taking the room step by step. About halfway through, Jefferson removed the body and he and his guys took off. Soon after, Torres and Luc came in to see if they were ready to go.
“I want to walk the house one more time,” Genevieve said. “See what the killer saw, what the victim experienced.”
“Okay.” Luc beat back a yawn. “Let’s do it.”
“You go on. I’ll be fine.”
Torres snorted. “Like we’re going to leave you here alone. Get real, Delacroix.”
“It’s fine. I’ll stay with her.” Shawn spoke up. “I wanted to do the same thing. If there’s a chance we can nail this bastard here, then I want to do it.”
“All right, then. We’ll follow the CSI guys in, see what they came up with.” Luc patted her shoulder and headed for the door.
“Yeah. And Jose should be in soon. I want to see what he came up with from Genevieve’s computer.”
Her stomach clenched and she jerked involuntarily. For a minute there, she’d almost felt like one of the guys again. Torres saw her reaction and correctly interpreted it. Shaking his head, he said, “Hey, Genevieve, don’t sweat it. We’re not.”
She nodded, but had a hard time looking him in the eye. “Call us if anything pops back at the station.”
“You’ll be the first.” Torres threw out a fake salute, then headed for the door.
Shawn cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Where do you want to start?”
“Outside. Near the point of entry.”
“Okay.”
They walked silently through the house, out the side door, into the garden. “So he brought her through here.” Genevieve pointed to the path. “But there’s no sign of struggle—nothing that said she didn’t come willingly.”
“Maybe he backtracked?”
“Maybe.” She looked around. “But there’s nothing—no broken plants, no leaves on the ground, nothing.”
“All right.” Shawn stepped around her. “So he brings her in here. But wouldn’t she notice him jimmying the lock? Be suspicious?”
“Not necessarily. There’s the old ‘I can’t believe I lost my keys at the club. Let’s go around to the side entrance. I think I’ve got a key there. Oops—no key. Let me mess with the lock, see if I can spring it.’ ”
“Exactly.”
“So they come in here, and she still doesn’t have any idea what’s going on. He takes her to the kitchen, gets her a glass of wine. Does he drug her?”
“We’ll know soon enough—the CSI guys took the glass.”
“Forget that. Does he drug her?”
“No.” Shawn shook his head. “He gets off on pain; he wants to hear her scream.”
“You think? What about the neighbors?”
“It’s the Quarter—people scream here all the time. Nobody even notices anymore.”
She thought about it. “Maybe. So she drinks the wine. One glass or two?”
“One. Once again, he doesn’t want to dull her too much. If she’s coming from the clubs, she’s already pretty loaded.”
“I agree. So they move from the kitchen to the family room.” Genevieve followed the path. “She kicks off her shoes right here.” She stood where they’d found the red stilettos. “Where does she go from here?”
“To the couch. She sits down, kicks her feet up on the coffee table. She’s relaxed, feeling pretty good now.”
“What’s not to feel good about? She’s gonna get lucky—and the guy is loaded. Look at this place. It’s like she’s hit the jackpot.” Genevieve sat on the sofa, did as Shawn had suggested and kicked her feet up.
“So does he sit with her?”
“Yeah.” Shawn sat next to her on the couch, angled his body toward her. “This is where he makes his move.”
“Sexually?” she asked. “Or is this where he gets violent?”
“There’re no candles in here.”
“Doesn’t mean he didn’t take them when he left.”
“True. But I think he just gets her warmed up in here.” He looked around. “There’s nothing to tie her to.”
Genevieve followed his gaze. “Good point. So, on to the bedroom?”
“Yeah.” He offered her his hand, pulled her off the couch and then led the way down the hall to the master bedroom, where the body had been found.
“Absolutely. This is where the action takes place.” She looked around the room they’d already spent more than two hours in—stared at the huge mirror that covered one wall. The gigantic white iron headboard that had long scratches gouged into the paint. “Once we find the owners, we need to ask if those scratches are new.”
“Oh, they’re new, all right. I’d bet my badge on it.”
She glanced at him over her shoulder, grinned. They’d always been on the same wavelength from the first day they met.
Shawn didn’t smile back, instead stared at her, hard. “Are you happy, Genevieve? With this guy, I mean? Does he ma
ke you happy?”
She glanced away, unable to look at the hurt in his eyes. “He does, Shawn. He really does.”
“Even with everything he does to you?”
She turned slowly, her heart shifting into overdrive. “How do you know what he does to me?”
“I’ve seen the pictures. I tried not to look, but …” His voice trailed off and he shrugged.
“It’s not what it looks like.” Had she ever been this uncomfortable? Maybe in the police station when the images were flashing across her screen, but that had been more panicked than anything else. This? This was just plain awkward.
“You sure about that?”
“Yeah, I am.” She looked at him impatiently. “Look, I know you’re just concerned about me, but I really don’t want to talk about this. Can we get back to work now, or what?”
“Sure. Sorry.”
Genevieve turned back to the bed, stared at it blindly. Tried to focus. Wondered what the hell she was supposed to say now. As she was standing there, too embarrassed to look at her partner, something occurred to her. “You know, I forgot to ask. How did we even know about the body? Who called it in?”
“A neighbor. He heard the scream, saw the light on.”
“I thought you said no one paid attention to screams in the Quarter.”
“They don’t.”
“What?” she asked, glancing at him over her shoulder. His voice sounded odd, unfamiliar. But it was too late—something hit her in the center of her back and sent her sprawling onto the bed the dead woman had been on. Before she could react, the shove was followed up with a punch to the face that had her seeing stars.
Shaking her head, she struggled to clear her vision. Then gasped as she caught sight of Chastian looming over her, Shawn crumpled at his feet.
Fear ripped through her and she struggled to get to her feet, even as Chastian shoved her back onto the bed.
Grabbing her wrist, he slipped handcuffs over it, then attached the other end to the headboard. She tried to fight him but she was still dizzy, still off balance.
Not to mention in shock. “Lieutenant, what are you doing?” she demanded.
“I would think it was obvious. Especially to Supercop herself. I would give you the benefit of the doubt if I still thought you were the original Ice Queen, but I’ve watched you with him. You’re the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”
It took her a minute to catch on, took time for the shock to slowly give way to understanding, and the understanding to give way to horror.
The whispered voice on the telephone. The sadistic notes. The photographs.
It had been him all along. Chastian had killed all those women, then had gone about terrorizing and discrediting her when she’d gotten too close. He was the one who had brutalized those girls, the one who had taken such delight in torturing her.
Her stomach revolted as she put everything together—the profile, his attitude, little details that she’d previously missed all came together in her head. It seemed so obvious now. How could she have missed it?
She was sure she’d only thought the words, but she must have spoken them out loud, because he laughed. Got closer to her. And stroked one shaky hand down her chest and stomach.
Genevieve recoiled before she could stop herself, her body as horrified as her brain at the thought of Chastian touching her. At the idea of him as a sick, heartless murderer.
Even as her muscles quivered, tried to stay out of Chastian’s reach, she knew that it was hopeless. The not-quite-sane look in his eyes promised that he would take her and hurt her, his narrow hips shoving between her legs.
“Not so confident now, are you, Genevieve? Not so full of yourself now that you’re not in control?” His breathing was heavy, his eyes darkening a little more with each unsteady rise and fall of his chest.
He tried to grab her second wrist, but she knew that once he caught it she would be completely helpless, a sitting duck unable to move or fight. So when his hands reached for her free wrist, she jerked it away, kicking up and out with her legs instead.
He jumped out of the way, but not quickly enough to avoid a foot to the chest. “Let me go,” she demanded. “There’s no way for you to win this thing.”
His laugh, when it came this time, was brittle. “I’ve already won, Genevieve. I have you and none of them know—none of them have a fucking clue what I’ll be doing to you. They’ll be at the station, searching for a suspect and I’ll be here, fucking you. Cutting you.”
He lunged for her wrist again and again she evaded him with a quick twist of her body. The arm that was locked into the handcuffs on the bed was starting to ache, the sharp twist and pull of her body as she tried to avoid complete capture putting too much pressure on it.
But she ignored it, desperation lending her strength and speed she never would have had otherwise. Chastian lunged for her a third, then a fourth time, but when he kept missing, he grew tired of the game.
Drawing back his fist, he hit her as hard as he could in the face, waited just out of reach as her eyes crossed and she started to go under.
Genevieve fought to stay awake, to ignore the darkness that hovered at the edge of her consciousness. But it wasn’t easy—she felt the punch all the way through her body, the crunch of Chastian’s fist sending waves of agony reverberating down her cheekbone and throughout her entire face. He’d hit her hard enough to daze her, more than hard enough to have her head ringing. And then he was grabbing her free wrist before she could stop him, dragging it toward the headboard.
He pulled out a second pair of handcuffs and fastened her right hand to the bed in the same fashion he’d already used on her left. As the handcuffs clanged against the iron headboard, fear burned in the pit of her stomach. And that was before he fastened her legs to the posts at the bottom of the bed.
Trussed up like a Christmas turkey, there was no way she was going to get out of this now. No way she could fight back against Chastian and whatever he planned to do to her.
For one endless moment, each of his victims flashed into her mind. Lorelei, Cyndi, Jessica, Maria, Sharon and the unknown woman who had dragged them all here tonight. The pain each had suffered had been overwhelming, all-consuming.
And as Chastian leaned over her, a knife in his hand and an insane glint in his eyes, she understood that she would die as the other women had—screaming.
Cole, her angry, battered mind cried out. Cole, I’m sorry.
He’d been right after all. She hadn’t believed him, and now her arrogance might very well be the death of both of them. For a moment she saw his face—angry, frightened, desperate to save her—and she knew. He wouldn’t survive her death. Twice in one lifetime was two times too many.
Chapter Twenty-four
Cole raced around Genevieve’s house, panic growing with every second that he couldn’t find her. He searched every room, despite the empty feeling of the house, frantic at the thought of some psychopath getting his hands on her in her own house.
He found her note in the kitchen right around the same time his instincts went on red alert. For a minute he tried to think past the sick panic, to tell himself he was overreacting because he was worried. Scared. He was in love for the first time in his life, and it was the ‘till death do us part kind of love. The thought of anything happening to her, of anyone taking her away from him—
Stumbling to a stop, Cole realized what he’d just been thinking. And though his head shied away from it, his heart knew the truth. He would love Genevieve forever—with her formidable intelligence and awe-inspiring temper, with her sweet heart and hot body, he loved her more than he’d ever loved anyone, even his sister. And he would do anything, give up everything, if it meant that she was safe.
With fear a living nightmare inside of him, he reached for the phone and dialed the precinct, only to realize she wouldn’t be there. With shaking hands, he tried her cell phone. And waited impatiently, each ring a painful eternity, for her to pick up.
He
was about to give up, to slam the phone back onto its charger when the ringing stopped. But it wasn’t Genevieve’s voice that came on the line. Instead, it was a male voice; high-pitched, a little deranged, it struck terror into his heart like nothing else ever had.
“Genevieve’s sorry, she can’t come to the phone right now. She’s a little tied up. But maybe I can help you?” There was a hysterical giggle followed by a silence that chilled his blood.
“Who is this?” he demanded. “Where’s Genevieve?”
“Geez, Cole, could you at least try to play along? Make this a guessing game. I mean, you don’t actually think I’ll tell you where she is, do you?”
“If you fucking touch her, I’ll rip you apart with my bare hands.”
There was a long silence, broken only by what sounded like Genevieve’s pain-filled scream. “You’re a lot dumber than you look, Cole, I’ve got to say. Issuing ultimatums like that just pisses me off. That one just got your little sweetheart sliced open from sternum to waist. But don’t worry, I didn’t cut deep.
“At least not this time.”
The phone went dead in his hand and Cole stared at it for a good fifteen seconds, horror rocketing through him. And then he was throwing his head back, a bellow of rage like nothing he’d ever felt before rising from within him.
He was going to find that son of a bitch. If it was the last thing he ever did, he would find him and kill him before he killed Genevieve.
Throwing on clothes on the fly, he dialed the police station and her partner. Surely Shawn would know where she was.…
* * *
Genevieve trembled in horror as Chastian hung up her cell phone and turned it off. Cole was looking for her, trying to find her. Elation warred with a bone-deep fear that he would find her like this—but too late to do anything but torture himself for not getting here in time.
She was spread-eagled on the huge four-poster bed, naked and blindfolded. Completely at Chastian’s mercy. He was taking it slow; a slap here, a pinch there. A tightening of her bonds until she lost all sensation in her arms and legs.
He’d keep her like that for a while and then loosen one of the knots so that blood—and painful sensation—rushed back to the body part all at once. And then, once the sensation had returned—painful second by painful second—he would tighten the bonds until the circulation was once again cut off.
