It scared her that this was happening again in her small town. Hawke was in prison. She should feel safe now, but she didn’t.
Maybe it was time to move away? Or for plastic surgery. The last made her laugh. People went through worse things, she reminded herself. That’s why she asked people to tell her the worst thing that had ever happened to them before she’d talk about her own experience. You couldn’t tell what people had gone through by looking at their faces, though Rachel tried. And no matter how terrible, at least she was still alive.
She clung to that.
She drove into the parking lot and found a space near the fence posts that marked the entrance to the footpath. She left the engine running as she tapped her bitten-to-the-quick fingernails against the steering wheel. He’d said they’d be here at six AM sharp.
Rachel checked her watch. Hopefully the clinic wouldn’t be busy at this time of day, but they still needed to hurry if they all wanted to make class.
The big SUV he sometimes drove pulled into the parking lot. He slid into the empty bay next to her and got out. She rolled down her window, and he leaned inside.
“She’s in the backseat.” He jerked his head toward the SUV. “She needs another woman to talk to. Someone she can trust.” Concern etched his features.
Rachel couldn’t see the young woman through the tinted-glass, but she had no doubt she’d be crying, replaying what had happened over and over in her head. Still, she sat there, paralyzed. Could she really listen to the details of another girl’s ordeal without imploding from misery?
“Look, maybe I should just take her home. Sorry I wasted your time—”
“No,” Rachel said softly, undoing her seatbelt. “Let me talk to her.”
He pressed his lips together and shrugged as she got out of the car. She went to the passenger door of his vehicle, and he followed, hands stuffed in his pockets.
She opened the door and looked inside, frowning in confusion as she stared at the empty seat. “I-I don’t understand.”
He grabbed her hair in one hand and slammed her head against the metal of the door. An explosion of white light was followed by blinding pain above her eye-socket. Something hard jabbed into her lower ribs. “You don’t have to understand, Rachel. You just have to do what I say.”
She cried out as he dragged her backward, shoved the door closed, and force-marched her toward the woods.
“What are you doing? Let go of me!” she yelled. She tried to get away, but he was so much stronger than she was. The pain in her scalp when he hauled her against him made her eyes bleed.
He laughed.
“Let go! I mean it.” She kicked out at him, but he shoved her onwards. She grabbed at his wrists to try and ease the pressure on her head, to reduce the searing pain in her skull. “Why are you doing this?” she screamed. It was hard to think. Hard to ignore the pain and panic to try and figure out what the hell was happening.
She’d trusted him. He shoved her onward. She screamed, but there was no one to hear, and her cries echoed uselessly through the forest.
“We’re just taking a walk. I need to tell you something.”
Bullshit. “Tell me now.”
“In a few minutes. It’s important.” She didn’t believe him. Her heart raced so fast it felt like a buzz saw in her chest. Why was he doing this? He knew what she’d been through. Why had he lied to her about another victim?
It was so cold she started to shiver violently. Or maybe that was the fear taking hold and shutting down her function. Her eyes darted into the shadows of the trees. If she could get out of his grasp, she could run. She could run forever. The grip on her hair tightened as if he read her mind.
They kept walking into the heart of the park.
“Where are we going? This is stupid! You’re scaring me.” Her voice got small when she needed it to be strong. It was happening again—the utter loss of control, the overwhelming sense of powerlessness. They’d walked for ages off the path into the forest, trudging through snow that soaked her jeans. “I don’t understand,” she sobbed.
“Of course you don’t.” He gave her a violent shove, and she fell, face-first.
She scooted onto her back and started crab-crawling away from him, through the snow. “Why are you doing this to me!”
“Oh, please, Rachel.” His tone was condescending. “I’m putting you out of your misery.”
“W-what?” She could barely breathe she was so scared.
He eyed her with mock concern. “I’m giving you a choice.”
“W-what choice?”
“Take your clothes off and lie down on the ground.”
Her throat felt raw from clawing back emotion. “Or?” she rasped.
A smile touched his lips, so callous and evil it eased between her ribs and into her heart like a blade. “Or I’ll do to you what I did last time, except there won’t be any drugs to block the reality of what’s happening this time. No convenient black outs.”
Pain streaked through her chest, and it took a moment to realize she was hyperventilating. “It was you! But that’s impossible. I saw Drew Hawke—”
“You saw what I wanted you to see.” He glanced at his watch as if bored.
“I know what I saw!” But there were so many pieces of broken information that didn’t fit together.
He pulled something large from his jacket pocket and placed it over his face. Blue eyes glittered from behind small holes in a facemask.
“You made a mask of his face?” She flashed back to that night, and it suddenly made sense. The utter lack of emotion shown by her attacker. The fact he hadn’t said a word.
She was going to throw up. Hawke was innocent. She’d helped send an innocent man to prison, and no one knew. A high-pitched squeal sounded inside her head—like her sanity was escaping her skull. Her only hope was to outrun this monster who’d taken so much from so many people. Who’d convinced her so thoroughly it was Drew, she’d taken a polygraph to swear he was guilty.
She had to tell someone.
He put the mask carefully back in his pocket. “You should have seen the look on Cassie’s face when she saw it.”
Rachel’s stomach knotted. He’d killed Cassie, and now he was going to kill her.
“Hypothermia isn’t supposed to be a bad way to go. It doesn’t hurt—you just fall asleep.”
She bolted. She scrambled under a pine and around a silver birch. She was small, but fast, and she would not let this twisted creature win.
She dodged right, but her foot hit a root, and she sprawled into the snow. A heavy weight smashed into her back before she could get up, shoving the air from her lungs so she lay there wheezing desperately, trying to draw in oxygen.
The weight of him behind her brought back a myriad of powerful memories from that night last year. A barrage of emotions—fear, rage, confusion. When she was finally able to haul in a breath she saw he held a rope, blue rope, just like Erin Donovan had shown her in photographs. Terror beat out revulsion.
She bucked against his weight, but he didn’t budge. Tears welled at the unfairness of it all.
“You killed those girls, raped the others. Framed Hawke. Why?” She screamed as long and as loud as her lungs allowed. Only silence answered. She drew in another breath, but he shoved her face into the snow.
“Shut the fuck up. No one’s going to hear you out here, and you’re giving me a headache.” She almost choked. He grabbed her ankles and dragged her to a nearby tree. The icy ground scratched her face.
“Why are you doing this?”
“To punish her.” He took in a deep breath as if winded.
Her? “My mother?”
He laughed, a horrible sound. “How can someone whose parents are so smart be so incredibly dumb?”
She flinched. “Who, then?” He was looking up as if searching for a place to throw the rope. He was looking for somewhere to set a noose… “Who are you trying to punish by doing these awful things to me?”
“Will you
just shut the fuck up.” He cut off a short length of rope and wrapped it around her head, tight, forcing the knot between her teeth. The edges of her lips split, and she tasted blood.
“Better.” He smirked.
She was trembling with cold and fear, but she edged onto the balls of her feet.
“Detective Donovan. I’m punishing Detective Donovan.”
She frowned in confusion. What did the detective need to be punished for? And why attack her, not Erin?
He leaned close. “That’s who I’m punishing. Because she’d a cheating whore.”
Rachel didn’t understand. But maybe it didn’t matter. He stood back to throw his rope over a nearby branch, and she pushed up from the ground and ran.
She didn’t look behind her, didn’t pause. She forced her legs to move faster than they’d ever moved before. She heard him thrashing through the bushes, but she was losing him. She felt elation. She’d won. She’d won! Then she realized she was running straight for a cliff, and he was closing in from behind. There was no escape. She heard his laughter. He knew she was running to her death like some stupid lemming.
And as the cliff loomed she realized she had a choice. Grab hold of life and take control—even if it meant certain death. Or suffer at the hands of a monster who wanted to destroy her over and over again. She took control and threw herself over that precipice, her heart soaring free as she sailed through the air.
* * *
Darsh cracked his eyelids apart at the sound of the shower. It took a fraction of a second to remember where he was and what he’d been doing for most of the night. He checked the clock. Six. Rubbed his eyes and rolled out of bed and walked buck-naked into the bathroom. Thick, billowing steam filled the air, but he could just make out Erin behind the frosted glass. All his good intentions about getting an early start evaporated.
He didn’t stop moving, just walked into the shower and grabbed the woman who’d filled his head with lust from the moment they’d met. He pressed her against the cool glass.
After a moment’s hesitation she kissed him, open-mouthed and sensual. Then she ran soap-slick hands over his back and shoulders. His body couldn’t get enough of her. His brain was struggling too. He lifted her up, and her legs went around him and he slid home. Then he froze.
“Fuck. I don’t have any condoms left.” His teeth were fused together in the effort not to move.
Her ankles pressed into the back of his ass, and she held his gaze. “I’m on birth control. I’m safe.”
She felt so good with no barrier between them. “I’m safe too, but…” He’d never done this before. Too many of his friends had become early parents, even the ones using condoms.
“We don’t have to. There are other ways.” Her smile told him she had plenty of ideas, but her muscles clamped around him, rippling in the early stages of orgasm.
“No, I want this.” Wanted it so much it was scary. And he sank into her, finding a rhythm that had her gasping and clawing at his back, trying to ride him, holding onto his shoulders. He watched her face as she teetered on the edge before crying out and crashing over. His own release swept over him like a wildfire rushing through parched grassland, obliterating everything before it. She collapsed against him, and he held her there, letting her breath settle as he watched water pour down her spine.
She raised her head, eyes no longer bright and febrile, but pensive and shadowed. “We need to get to work, and pretend we didn’t stay up most of the night having sex.”
Carefully he let her feet slide to the floor. She looked a little shell-shocked. Rather than pleasure on her face, there was sadness. He’d promised her a better ending than the last time, but she knew reality would rip them apart. They’d broken the rules. Hooked up when they should have been keeping it professional and working the case. He grabbed some shower gel, which he smoothed on her body then his, washing her, cleansing her.
“What if this didn’t have to end?” he said.
She tensed beneath his fingers.
“I thought three years ago was the best sex I’d ever have in my life, but last night blew that away. What if it keeps getting better?” What if they were meant to be together?
She looked away. “It’s just sex.”
He knew better. Their “just sex” was like comparing an incendiary device to a party popper. But Erin had been through hell. She was obviously gun-shy when it came to relationships.
“What if we carry on seeing each other after this is all over and actually find out?” Darsh willed her to meet his gaze, but she kept those blue eyes steadfastly fixed on the floor and tried to sidestep him. “What if we give this craziness between us a chance?”
She gave a harsh sounding laugh and stepped out of the shower, slipping into a robe. He followed, and she handed him a towel. He rubbed his hair dry, and he watched her watching him naked in her bathroom.
Despite the look of female appreciation on her face she wasn’t throwing him any positive vibes about seeing each other again.
“We can’t.” Her throat moved as she swallowed.
“Why not?” Another thought occurred to him. He bristled. “Is it the fact we’re from different backgrounds?”
Her mouth rounded in shock. “What? Are you insane? If you’re good enough to go to bed with then you’re good enough to date, jackass. And if you’re insinuating there’s a race agenda here, you aren’t as smart as you think you are.”
He’d had plenty of women who wanted him for a one-nighter but hadn’t wanted to be seen in public with him. It had started in high school and happened numerous times since. But if race wasn’t the issue for Erin, what was?
“We live in different states, and you’re investigating my work on the Hawke case, remember?”
Like he could forget. He scrubbed the towel over his back and down his legs. However much he hated it, she was right.
She marched past him to get dressed, and he followed, digging a clean T-shirt and black pants out of his bag. He wasn’t ready to give up. “What about when this is all over?”
She snapped on her weapon and pulled on her boots. Her lips pressed together in an angry line. “We’ll still be in different states.”
“You could move?”
“Ha! Where’ve I heard that before? Quit your job and your friends—”
“Hey, I’m not your ex.” Rage rushed through him. “Don’t ever compare me to him.”
“Or what?” She put her hands on her hips, spoiling for a fight. He got that now.
His chin went up. “I meant quit Forbes Pines PD. Join the FBI or some bigger police department. You’d make a hell of an agent.”
Her eyes went wide, and her arms dropped to her sides. She took a deep breath. “Oh.”
“Yeah, ‘oh.’” He pulled on his holster and checked his SIG. Made sure he had all his clothes and belongings in his go-bag because chances were this was his one and only night in Erin’s bedroom.
He’d tried. He’d put himself out there, and she’d rejected him. At least he hadn’t walked away without trying to explore whether or not this explosive chemistry between them meant something more than just sex.
He swung his bag on his shoulder, but paused on the threshold of the bedroom. “One of these days you’re going to stop running away from the fear of being hurt again.” He looked back to where she stood frozen in place. “I just hope there’s a little bit of life waiting for you when you do.”
Chapter Eighteen
Erin walked briskly up the stairs to the Department of Psychology and Professor Huxley’s office. She and Darsh had shared a silent ride to work where she’d found her car with the tire replaced and a note from her buddy Manny on the dash.
At least she had friends in the department. That might change if they found out that after three years of rejecting every guy who’d asked her out, she’d hooked up with the first federal agent to pass through. Waking up in his arms had brought on a strong hit of remorse. If their bosses or co-workers found out they were involv
ed her career would suffer. She’d devoted too much of her life to her job to lose it over one night of reckless passion. And the idea they had more than that going for them? That was Darsh’s conscience talking. Or leftover lust.
He’d get over it. Hell, he’d be thanking her before long.
She ignored his barb about always running away. She’d needed to put some distance between herself and NYC, that was all. Being alone wasn’t a damn crime.
She reached the third floor, searching for Huxley’s office, which had moved since the last time she’d visited. Signs directed her left. The hallways were quiet except for her footsteps, which echoed on the parquet flooring.
The idea of joining the FBI teased her mind. But she wasn’t uprooting just because some guy made her come more times than she could count. Yeah, reduce it to sex, Erin, and you might just convince yourself that’s all there is to it.
She found Room 345 and knocked on the door.
There was a rustle of papers and the screech of a chair from inside. Then a hesitant, “Come in.”
She opened the door and there was Huxley with a female student standing at his shoulder clutching what looked like an essay.
“Erin! Come on in,” Huxley said jovially. Too jovially for this time in the morning, but that was just her personal opinion.
“Thanks, Monica. I’ll see you in class. If you have more questions about your essay, email me or talk to Rick or Linus.”
Erin waited for the girl to walk past her. Her cheeks were flushed. Was that guilt in her eyes? Had they been doing something they shouldn’t? Or was the inability to meet her gaze and anxiousness to disappear based on personal dislike, which seemed more prevalent when it came to Erin’s dealings with anyone on campus?
Erin didn’t know, but Huxley wouldn’t quite meet her gaze either. His hair was mussed. Lips reddened. It crossed her mind that he and the student might have been doing more than an essay review before she’d rapped on the door. Right now, Erin didn’t care about moral turpitude. As long as they were both over the age of consent and no one was breaking any laws then they could go at it like rabbits for all she cared.
Cold Hearted (Cold Justice Book 6) Page 21
