Another tried-and-true friend, Velma Gentry, a waitress at the Country Kitchen, where Skye had worked right out of high school, had agreed to help in a pinch. Velma could be counted on to put her considerable customer service skills to work she’d honed for more than thirty years waiting tables. Skye believed Velma would make an excellent coordinator when it came time for the foundation to go into crisis-mode.
And it would happen. One thing Skye knew for certain, a sexual predator couldn’t change his habits. Sooner or later, he’d go after a kid, either male or female. Sometimes it didn’t matter which. Because of that, the foundation had to be in ready-mode. It was Skye’s job to make sure they had an effective game plan.
For reinforcements on that score, Skye relied on Travis Nakota, the man who had been like father figure to her since her own parents had died when she was thirteen. If only she could have spent that time living with Travis instead of in Yakima where she’d been shipped off to live with religiously fanatical Aunt Ginny and Uncle Bob, her only blood relatives.
Nothing she could do about that now though, she decided as she made her way through the swanky lobby and to the bank of elevators. Looking around at the polish and shine of the impressive thirty-story Breslin Building, as the locals called it, Skye realized Josh had known exactly which buttons to push to get her to sign on the dotted line.
She might’ve caved about the location and the digs. She might never have thought in a million years she’d have an “office” with a perfect view of the Space Needle and Mount Rainier. But when it came to furnishing the place, she had stuck to her belief in keeping everything to a minimum. Sparse would assure that no one mistook their work for anything but what it was.
The Artemis Foundation located missing children. Period.
Since they were funded by private donations, Skye Cree intended to make sure every dollar went back into the foundation for just that purpose. Not only would she see to it personally, she would have it no other way.
Unlocking the door to suite three-hundred, Skye stepped into a barebones operation. Looking around, she knew the furnishings didn’t exactly jive with the ritzy address. Even though Josh had done his best to talk her into ordering modern, sleek desks and accessories, Skye had refused to give in. On this one thing she wouldn’t budge on principle alone.
That’s why, at present, a six-foot-long folding table she’d found at a big-box hardware store doubled as a desk. She’d picked up a used but still comfy, ergonomic mesh chair on Craigslist for thirty bucks. Josh had provided a credenza from one of the vacant offices upstairs to hold all of the files she’d put together over the years on abducted and still-missing children.
On the wall behind her workspace, a huge map hung pinpointing each and every child abduction that had taken place within a seventy-five-mile radius of Seattle. Some dated all the way back to 1970. Pictures of each child were tacked to the paper as a reminder.
While Josh might have pushed her face first into this foundation business, Skye had to concede that over the summer she’d settled into the role as director. Even though she still didn’t spend a whole lot of time here, she had to admit it was a better place to organize than the cramped four walls of her crappy apartment. Here she could set up her MacBook and devote her time and energy to hunting down Seattle’s missing children along with the predators who had snatched them.
She’d even come to terms with making the commute into downtown three or four times a week, even dealing with the headaches of finding an available parking place in the packed garage. While Josh had offered her an assigned spot with her name stenciled on it, she had passed on that perk outright. No doubt she’d been tempted. But it didn’t seem right for her to take up someone else’s space when she didn’t always make the drive in like many of his employees did five days a week. So, once again, she’d opted out.
When the desk phone rang, she dumped her bag down onto the fake walnut-grain tabletop and all but fell over the metal to answer it. “Artemis Foundation.”
“Hello, my gorgeous Skye. What are you wearing?” the voice on the other end greeted her.
Breathless, that familiar voice had her bursting out a laugh. “Josh.” It still made her heart race a little each and every time she heard that sexy way he said her name. She thought of his silver-colored eyes, his black mane of hair that only recently had grown long enough that he had to tie it back in a stubby ponytail. Despite the crime scene she’d visited earlier, a smile formed on her lips.
“How’d it go with cranky pants?” Josh asked.
A giggle snaked out. “Harry wants to make up.”
“Good, I knew he’d come around if you gave him enough time.”
“Josh, he needs help dealing with a serial killer. I sorta agreed both of us would help him on this case—as consultants. At the moment, he has nothing but DNA matching five crime scenes. So far, no hits in CODIS.”
“Interesting. And you didn’t puke at the crime scene?” Josh mused.
“I was a consummate professional.”
“Good job. What impressions did you get about the guy so far?”
Skye gave him a blow-by-blow of Sylvia Waterston’s crime scene, of what she knew firsthand, of what she’d sensed about the killer.
“Okay. Sure, we’ll give it a shot. But you never answered my question. What are you wearing?”
Another laugh escaped. After months together, Skye had yet to perfect the art of flirting. Even with Josh it didn’t come easy for her. She’d lived too many painful years—between thirteen and eighteen shy and reticent after her kidnapping ordeal—before she’d decided to leave that part of herself in the dust for good. Josh had made that transition possible.
So she gave the flirting thing her best shot. “I’ll tell you what I’m wearing. But you have to go first, share a few deets.” She should’ve known better than to try to one-up Josh Ander, who always seemed primed to take it to the next level.
“There’s this thong. You could come up here and take it off. I’d let you.”
Once again, that had her breaking out in laughter. “You could come down here.”
“If only I could ditch all these pesky marketing people and software engineers who want to make my life more difficult.”
“The gamers want updates. They made Hidden Cities of Mars a greater success than Mines.”
“That they did. And I’m grateful, not saying I’m not. That’s one of the reasons I’m stuck here today. It seems we have a few bugs to work out if we intend to make our deadline, which we always do even if it involves cracking the whip over my very dedicated staff and making them put in overtime. But you and I could go to lunch around one if we make it quick.”
“Josh, I’d love to, but I promised Harry I’d put together some data for him.”
“What kind of data?”
“This guy likes to spend an inordinate amount of time with his victims. Hours in fact.”
“So Harry needs to contact a profiler at the FBI. That’s what they do.”
“He’s done that already. But I suggested he might look into other serial sexual homicides, the facts and figures, specifically what’s called need-driven behavior. I’m pretty sure it’s this guy’s signature, some kind of fantasy he’s playing out each time.”
“So we’ve got a cat burglar rapist who kills and spends an inordinate amount of time with his victims. He’s not a quick, in-and-out kind of guy. Sick puppy.”
“Harry gave me copies of the case files.”
Josh didn’t like the sound of that. “I want you to tell me now if you’re up to looking at those kinds of photos, Skye,” Josh asked.
She grinned into the phone. His concern always touched her. “I was at the real deal this morning, Josh. I’m pretty sure I can browse through and study a dozen or so photographs of the other crime scenes.”
It was Josh’s turn to laugh. “My warrior goddess. I should’ve known. Sometimes I forget she’s made of sterner stuff. How about we go over all this when I get hom
e tonight. How’s that? Before you head out on your nightly rounds.”
“Good. Because I’ll need some time to come up with all the data.”
When they disconnected, Skye went into the little kitchenette area the suite provided to brew a pot of coffee. Even though it was almost eleven o’clock, she didn’t feel as though she’d had enough wake-up juice. After waiting on the ancient Mr. Coffee she’d brought from home to gurgle and perk, Skye fixed herself a cup and settled in at her laptop for research.
There were a number of decent Internet sites that provided a glimpse into deviant and ritualistic sexual homicide. And the fact that she knew all the words to put into the searches to get optimum results was a pretty sad mindset. But you couldn’t track predators if you didn’t keep up on the stats and the particulars of their crimes.
And Skye Cree made sure she never missed an update.
Chapter Three
Once Skye left the downtown area, she headed to the gym to put in some serious time in the weight room. As she’d discovered over the years, it was the best place to work out her frustrations. As busy as she’d been this summer with getting the foundation up and going, she needed to remember that staying in shape meant staying at the top of her game. Josh might not need the reps in routine as much as she did these days to stay in shape. Being ten percent wolf might mean he could miss a run on the treadmill once in a while. But she couldn’t. Sitting behind a desk for hours and hours didn’t mean she should get soft and sloppy now.
But that was hardly the reason she felt like punching something right this minute.
In her computer searches she’d discovered two murders in Portland, Oregon that fit the pattern of their serial killer down to the letter. The fact he’d used a knife on those victims had weighted the scale. And it seemed the Portland women had nothing in common except they were attractive and lived alone. Both homicides had been committed months apart and went back years earlier. Both remained unsolved and relegated to Portland’s cold case files.
Skye knew in her heart the two crimes were related to Seattle’s. But proving it was the challenge. She wasn’t sure her investigative skills were up to the task. But as Harry had already pointed out, the cops were already at the “grasping at straws” stage. She couldn’t very well make the case any worse even if her visions had been greatly weakened since Kiya, the wolf, had abandoned her, gone over to the other side, or rather to Josh’s side.
As she circled the block for the third time, trying to find a parking place on the street, she decided she was doing her damnedest to handle the fact she’d lost her spirit guide. Somewhere between Kiya, the wolf, taking the leap into Josh and saving him from certain death, Skye’s path, her destiny had changed.
Kiya now belonged more to Josh, was stronger in him, than had ever been in her. And there wasn’t a whole lot she could do about losing something inside her that she’d had the whole of her life. She couldn’t pitch a fit about it and have Kiya pop back to return to the way things had been before. So she’d have to suck it up and learn to live without that essence inside.
When she spotted a place to park, she pulled her Subaru to a stop, snagged her gym bag out of the back, and started footing it the two blocks in the opposite direction.
As soon as she reached a set of stairs that led below street level, she hustled down the steps to a brown door with white letters that read, “Private Entrance Keep Out.”
She chuckled at the sign knowing full well Travis had his “privacy issues.” Slipping her key in the lock, she entered what could only be described as a basement-type locker room. Like her office space, Travis Nakota’s personal gym was pretty much barebones in its simplicity. The musty smell here was as familiar to her as the breakfast special at Country Kitchen, another place that belonged to Travis and one where, at one time, she’d spent her share of time flipping burgers.
But now, looking around the workout room, she noted the high beamed ceiling sported its share of water stains from decades back. Faded green, well-worn indoor/outdoor AstroTurf covered a concrete floor. In certain spots duct tape did its best to hold down mismatched seams, here and there, that wanted to turn up at the ends.
The plain workout area sported a fancy treadmill that could be used in bad weather, a decent weight bench, a state-of-the-art elliptical, and the not-so-fancy punch bag Travis was now jabbing.
From across the room, Skye heard the thudding of a fist hitting leather in repeated quick blows. She spotted Travis going toe-to-toe with the old-fashioned speedbag. Even though he wore a sweatband around his head, sweat trickled down his cinnamon face. His long black ponytail trailed down his back and bounced with each punch to the bag.
The fifty-year-old Native American man, who stood about five-feet-ten, glanced over at Skye. “’Bout time you got around to working out,” Travis grumbled. “Gettin’ lazy lately. All that time spent in your fancy downtown office is taking away from your training time. Taking away training time leaves you vulnerable when you go out at night.”
Even though his voice held a certain amount of disapproval, Skye saw him wink in her direction. Because she knew her dad’s oldest and dearest friend could be a pain in the butt on the best of days, she didn’t allow his mocking tone to get a reaction. The man was her oldest and dearest friend, particularly when she’d moved back to Seattle after leaving Yakima behind at eighteen. Since then, Travis had been her rock.
He’d given her a job as a fry cook at his Country Kitchen diner until the day a lawyer by the name of Doug Jenkins had walked through the door. Doug had been her parents’ attorney. Without her knowing about it, Doug had taken the small amount of money her parents had left her and invested it so that Skye could live off the inheritance for several years without having to go to work for anyone else. That is, if she didn’t develop extravagant spending habits.
Skye would be forever grateful to Doug Jenkins and his investment expertise for giving her the opportunity to work on her own.
If only the courts at the time had seen fit to send her to live with Travis instead of packing her off to her aunt and uncle life would’ve been so much better. Who knew if that one decision by the judge would have changed Skye’s path in life? Certainly she could have benefited from the guidance of someone like Travis. Travis’s influence could’ve provided some much-needed insight into a lot of things, mainly in the spirit guide department. In that, she could’ve used an instruction manual. Travis could’ve played that role for her. As it was, getting shipped off to Yakima, which to thirteen-year-old Skye, had amounted to Siberia, she’d experienced major problems with the transition.
Trying to handle the deaths of her parents had been traumatic on its own. But having to adhere to a fanatical religious regimen was culture shock. About that same time, she’d had to accept Kiya, her spirit guide, as an integral part of her life. Having so much thrown at her at once had been damned near emotionally impossible. Add in the normal teen angst at the time, and along with everything else, sometimes Skye wondered how she’d survived those years at all.
“Well, I’m here now,” Skye finally sniped back at Travis in the same derisive tone. “Looks like you’re working off a mad. What happened?”
“Always were perceptive.”
She tilted her head to study him. “Come clean. What’s up?”
“My rumor mill has been working overtime. Little birdies told me Harry wants to drag you into this serial killer case. I don’t like it.”
Skye let out a sigh. How was it Travis always seemed to know things before she ever got around to telling him the news?
She puffed out a breath and pointed a finger at him. “You’re overreacting. Again. It’s a consultant job and the money will go to the foundation.”
“And pit you against one of Seattle’s most dangerous individuals. I don’t think it’s a good idea, Skye. Josh might be better backup now than he was before. But you get in over your head with this serial killer business and you could easily be in deep shit. Both of you coul
d be.”
“Why is it you never have any faith in my abilities to catch the bad guys? Why is that? Why is it you automatically think I can’t take care of myself when you’re the one who trained me?”
The accusation had him stopping in mid-punch. “I have every belief in your abilities. It’s this psycho I’m worried about.”
“What exactly do you know, Travis? According to Harry, the general public doesn’t even know about this guy yet.” She kept studying Travis’s face then narrowed her eyes. “You have someone on the inside, don’t you? Why have you never mentioned this to me before?”
She watched as Travis stalled for time, watched him pull off his gloves, and go over to the mini-fridge to grab a bottle of water. Growing impatient, Skye snapped, “How long have you been keeping tabs on things without coming clean with me about it?”
Travis held up a hand. “Do you think I liked knowing you walked the streets at night in some of Seattle’s roughest neighborhoods looking for that damned pervert Whitfield? Seven years, Skye. You’ve been at this for seven years. All the while I worried myself sick about you. Even with Kiya at your side, there were nights I couldn’t sleep knowing you were out there alone. If I could have, I would’ve hired an army to make sure you were safe.”
“So you’ve been keeping tabs on me all this time? Who do you have on the inside, Travis?”
A “deer caught in the headlights” look came into the man’s eyes. “It isn’t what you think.”
“Then it shouldn’t be a problem leveling with me now.”
“It’s Drummond, okay? Satisfied now?”
“You and Harry?” Skye blinked in amazement, truly stunned at the revelation. But then she considered the past few years or so and realized now the two men had avoided being in the same room with each other. Had that been deliberate just to throw her off? She opened her mouth to say something and couldn’t. For several long seconds, she stood there staring at the man she’d trusted. “I don’t believe this. All this time spent training me and you had absolutely no faith that I could take care of myself. What did you two do? Have me followed?”
Skye Cree 02: The Bones Will Tell Page 3
